How It Should Have Been
by The White Guardian
Summary: We all make mistakes, but not all have such immense consequences. The universe has a cruel sense of humor, but what if some jokes had never been told? Follow Kaden and eventually, his son through their lives but with a twist, what if one of the universe's greatest mistakes had never happened? What if things, if only for once, went the way they should have been? [AU]
1. Hello, World

**Hello everyone!**

 **So, without further ado, here's my first attempt at an AU. And no, it's no coincidence that this story is published on the day that it is exactly two years ago that I started my first story. It's nearly become customary by this point that I begin a new story on March 10th...**

 **Anyhow, the idea behind this story is, what if Alister had listened to Kaden? But before we get to that part, let's follow the father of the most famous Lombax through his life.**

 **...**

 **Okay, I'm entirely out of things to say... might as well get this started then, eh?**

* * *

Darkness, then blinding light. Noise, then deafening silence. Warmth, then burning cold.

 _Where? What? Don't understand! Where is sound? Where is I? Want sound!_

How a maelstrom of such caliber could be found in the most unusual places, for example a head that had not yet witnessed the hands of the clock move past a minute. A head that was desperately trying to make sense of everything that was going on, grasping at familiarity and something to hold on to in this land of the unknown.

A head in which this storm of thoughts kept raging until it discovered something familiar among the blast of information coming through.

 _There sound! Calm. Safe._

The wailing died out, and everything went silent save for an occasional beep and the sound of crying.

"Come, madam. Let's get you out of here."

" _Move? Where go? No fear. Safe. Sound is here. Oh. Move stop._ "

"Alexis."

" _Noise? What new noise? Sound familiar. Must see... see! Light! Too bright! Not safe!_ "

"It's a boy."

" _Noise familiar. Light unsafe. Noise safe. Calm."_

"He has my fur and your eyes."

"He does."

"He's surprisingly calm. If you see those babies in the movies they're constantly wailing their parents' ears off."

"M-hm. I'm just so happy he's finally here, dear."

" _Warmth. Safe. What is noise? Gold blob, silver everywhere._ "

There was a laugh that sounded familiar. "Alexis, do you remember the names, dear?"

"Of course I do. Welcome to the world."

"Kaden."

" _What 'kaden'? No understand!_ "

The sound of wailing filled the room. Alexis looked up at her husband, who wiped some cream colored hairs out of her face before kissing her. "I love you, Alexis."

"I love you too, Michael."

Michael Starlight pulled a chair over and sat down next to his wife, who lovingly held their child in her silver arms. Michael looked at her. She looked so tired yet so alive at the same time. Then he looked down at their child, their son, nothing more than a ball of golden fur with two large emerald eyes.

Her eyes. Comparing them, a smile formed on Michael's lips when he discovered that same spark of excitement and life that he loved to see in his wife's eyes so much in the eyes of their son.

A doctor came walking in, a Cazar with blue shoulder-length hair. She smiled. "As you can see both your wife and child are safe and well. We have been able to perform a quick scan of the child's genetic makeup and discovered no flaws for known Lombax genetic diseases."

"Thank Orvus." Came Michael's relieved response. "Did you hear that, Alexis? Alexis?"

Turning to his wife, he saw that she had fallen asleep in the hospital bed, although she was still holding their child as if it was the most precious thing to her.

Because it was, to them both. The child's tiny head stuck out of the blanket wrapped around it's body, it's two emerald eyes looking practically everywhere.

Michael smiled. How he couldn't wait to get home. The kid would love it, he was sure of that.

" _But,_ " he reminded himself, _"that's something for later._ "

He took out a camera. "Shall I take the picture?" the doctor offered.

"Yes, please." The young father replied with a thankful smile. He sat down next to his wife's bed and smiled as the doctor saved the moment for eternity.

* * *

 **So this may be a short chapter but truthfully this is only the introduction, and I can't add that much to this part. The next chapters will be significantly longer, I promise. Usually between 1K and 8K.  
**

 **But until that chapter is up, please leave a review and let me know what you think!**

 **Either way, have an awesome day, and (hopefully) see you in the next chapter!**


	2. Diurnal and Nocturnal

**Score!**

 **No kidding, I seem to have hit gold with this plot if the reviews and massive view rates are anything to go by, and I have to say, thank all of you for reading thus far! I can only hope that every future chapter lives up to everyone's expectations.**

 **Reviews:**

 **Max Chronicle: "** ** _Dude, yes!  
Believe me, I'll be back for more Lombax Spizness. Because, let's be honest for a sec:  
WHO THINKS LOMBAXES ARE LAME?  
Max out.  
P.S. Now, if you'll excuse me, PFP Ch. 3 is calling._"  
Thank you! And if the massive popularity of Ratchet and Clank worldwide is any indication, I'd guess there are thousands of people who would agree with you. Anyhow, here's hoping this chapter will live up to your expectations.**

 **TheLilyoftheValley: "** ** _Wow Guardian! Isn't this the third (or fourth?) post this week? Great job! I also might need some of that writing mojo you've been running off of. I got a lot of stories I need to write this week._**

 ** _Nice start to the story, and such an interesting concept too! I'm quite interested to see where you take this, since the story seems to take place well before even Ratchet was born... Wait... Is Tachyon going to come in soon?!_**

 _ **Yep, I'm here for the long haul then.**_

 ** _Great work! I can't wait for the next chapter! :)_ "  
Hey, your username seems familiar... oh yeah, with that whole Wattpad thief situation I fought for every stolen story, including one of yours if my memory isn't lying to me. Either way, now that you point it out like that, that is a surprising amount of activity for someone who usually doesn't upload in weeks (I'm lazy... 0_0) so I'm actually rather surprised by my own activity as of recently myself. I wish I could share some of my writing mojo, I really do, but I'm afraid the best thing I can give is advice which is: don't rush. It sounds somewhat controversial but it's true, taking some time off writing and reading other stories usually gives me plenty of inspiration to get back to writing myself. You know what they say, good artists copy, great artists steal. While you shouldn't take that literally at all, it does point out something important: when you're out of inspiration yourself, take inspiration from others - that's absolutely free.  
**

 **The concept of this story has actually been bubbling away in the back of my mind for a while now, the question I was wondering is what would happen if I would take my OC Hypernova and whisper stuff about Tachyon's attack into his ear so he could save everyone. Put simply, what would the R &C universe be like if that walking zit called Tachyon had never risen to power. Who would Ratchet be, what would happen to Clank, Drek and Nefarious, that sort of thing. I finally decided to write it out, but ended up starting even further back and shedding some light on a subject that is not covered that often by fanfics - the life of Ratchet's father. There are certainly fics out there about Kaden's teenage years but I have not come across any regarding his childhood. Whether or not Hypernova will appear is not certain at this point as I'm not keen on bringing my overpowered OC into this, if I do end up doing so changes to the character will be necessary, but that is a worry for later down the line. I certainly do have some rather adorable scenes planned out for Kaden though, I'm positive you will all love it!**

 **To answer your question regarding Tachyon, what happens to the bastard is something I won't be spoiling, but his sorry mug won't appear anytime soon, not before Kaden reaches maturity at least, and with various chapters planned before that I doubt you'll be seeing that big party-pooper called Percival Tachyon anytime soon.**

 **Thank you once again, and I hope you'll like this chapter just as much! Enjoy!**

 **Falcy: "** ** _What a way to start this story off! I'm curious to see what will happen later on in this wonderful AU you've created, TWG. Anyhoo, keep it up! ;)_**

 ** _P.S. Are you planning to get the Nintendo Switch, cuz I sure am!(although it could take a while since the consoles sold out in two hours once, I think...)_**

 ** _P.S.S. When will Epilogue 3 be updated? It's been quite a while._**

 ** _P.S.S.S. Wonder what will happen to Tachyon in this AU..._ "**  
 **Thank you! And I will certainly try to keep this writing speed up as long as possible.**  
 **P.S. I'm not sure. The Switch had a lot of promise but someone at Nintendo should be fire for the sheer amount of stupid mistakes they made with the darn thing. For example the dock often leaves scratches on the screen because it's just plastic, consoles with some unresponsive pixels are surprisingly common and the amount of downright broken-from-store switches is ridiculous. Until Nintendo fixes this mess I'll be saving my money. It's certainly a wonderful idea but I sure as heck am not gonna pay 300 dollars for something that breaks so easily. I don't want LittleBigPlanet 3 all over again (for your information, LBP3 is a very unstable game for the PS3 and PS4, and is downright unplayable on the former due to loading issues. I've lost all of my files more times than I can count already). If Nintendo pushes out an update to the Switch line fixing at least some of this launch day mess then I may reconsider, but right now the odds of ending up with a defective console seem too great for me to be willing to risk 300 dollars on it. On the other hand, the games promised for the Switch are amazing, especially Breath of the Wild has been able to capture my attention. I wasn't that interested in a Zelda-style survival game at first, but the story behind the game and the character development visible in the trailer were more than enough to make me realize what a gem this game is.**  
 **P.S.S. It has been a while indeed. Truthfully I'm not quite happy with the story. It seems rushed and I have trouble fleshing things out, so far the whole story seems so bare-bones that I'm considering deleting it and taking the story down a different path, or at least take a break from Epilogue 3 until I come up with a definitive plot that doesn't feel so rushed and shallow. I hope you understand, and my apologies that it takes me so long to update the story.**  
 **P.S.S.S. That's something I won't be spoiling, but I dare say you'll be surprised! Anyhow, I hope you'll enjoy this chapter just as much!**

 **DragonMan2000: "** ** _I've been reading your stories long before I got my own account to keep track of the ones I like. I really look forward to reading the rest of this story as well as any future stories that you release. Happy birthday by the way_ "  
Aww, thank you so much! I hope I won't fail to live up to your expectations, and here's hoping you'll enjoy this chapter just as much.**

 **bajy: "** ** _It was strange but nice_ "  
Thanks! In case you were wondering what the 'basic English' was all about, that was actually written from the perspective of the newborn Kaden, who is trying to make sense of this unknown world that he suddenly finds himself in. Either way, glad you enjoyed it, and I hope you'll enjoy this chapter just as much.**

* * *

Michael yawned as he stared at the computer screen in front of him. He was absentmindedly typing away on the keyboard, his mind refusing to stay in place and continuously drifting off to the being lying in the bed behind him.

There were bags under his eyes, and he glanced at the clock at the top-right corner of his screen. '3:23 A.M.' it read. He shook his head, only six more hours, the last three of which he would spend with his wife, who was currently catching some well-needed sleep.

A smile formed on his lips whenever he thought of his wife, Alexis Starlight. How radiant she looked when she had Kaden with her. The sparkle of joy and life in her eyes present at all times. Her beautiful face and that fine coat of fur, but mostly her beautiful eyes, and how those beautiful eyes had been passed on to his son as well.

That's when he realized he had been writing crap, and that the codes would likely crash the system rather than having the desired effect, a billboard object spawner. He chuckled when he saw how many mistakes he had made, and he shook his head as he deleted his past hour of work. The boys were going to kill him.

Immediately the mind of the young father drifted off to his wife and the new member of their family who was, thankfully, asleep right now.

Kaden's inconsistent sleeping pattern had cost both of his parents a lot of well-needed rest, resulting in them coming up with the solution of one parent looking after their child during the day, and the other during the night.

He suddenly closed the typewriter and brought up that good old application in the top-left corner of his desktop, a spot reserved solely for programs of this type.

He placed his fingers on the keyboard, before he suddenly began to type like a madman. For a moment he was worried that he would wake Kaden up, but he dismissed the thought a second later, overtaken by inspiration as his fingers danced across the keys and his blue eyes took in the masterpiece flowing from his fingertips.

Two-and-a-half hours later Alexis walked in. She was still in her pajamas and her hair was a mess, but she didn't care.

"Morning." she yawned as she let her head rest on her husband's.

Michael took her hand and smiled. "I hope you slept well, dear."

She smiled. "Thanks to you, I did. I've made breakfast for you downstairs."

"I'll be there in a flash." Michael said. Alexis nodded and planted a kiss on his head before picking up her waking child and walking down the stairs.

Michael saved his work, and exported it, before uploading it to his profile on an art website, his page mostly dedicated to three-dimensional artwork. He had tried audio too a few times, but no matter what he tried, nothing would ever take off, but he didn't care.

He pressed 'enter' on the keyboard, submitting his overnight symphony, and walked down the stairs, where Alexis had lovingly made him bacon and eggs.

She greeted him with a kiss on the cheek while Kaden was lying in her arms, looking around in wonder with those green eyes of his before they settled on his father.

Michael stared back into those green and curious irises and wondered what went through the infant's mind. He chuckled, he could probably write a long and confusing novel about it that would end up more poetic than scientific.

He ate his meal in silence, his lack of sleep causing a headache that was getting angrier by the second. Despite his lack of sleep and the fact that he almost fell asleep a few times right there and then, and would comically have ended up with his head in his food, he would not raise his voice at any of his family members. Instead, he stored his frustration and used it to propel himself through his days.

Alexis once asked him about it, and told him that, if it was bothering him, it was okay to vent his frustration in her presence, and that she knew he wouldn't mean anything that he'd say. His response was simple. " _I could never hurt you._ "

Alexis walked over to him and wrapped her arms around his neck. "Sweet dreams, dear. And thank you."

"No problem." he said, getting up as he finished his meal. "Just leave it there, I'll clean it up later." Alexis said before giving her husband one last kiss, after which he went upstairs to sleep.

* * *

Michael smiled in his sleep, as his dreams brought him back to some wonderful memories.

Their first kiss.

They weren't friends back then, in fact, they barely knew anything about the other save for their beauty, name, and manners.

However, both would be eternally grateful for that warm August afternoon.

As if by some weird coincidence, Alexis' last lesson of the day had dropped out, meaning that she and Michael, who were both in different classes at the academy, would be done with school for the day at exactly the same time.

It was rainy when Michael stepped outside, taking out an umbrella to protect himself from the weather. It was then that he noticed a silver blob in the corner of his eye. It was Alexis, who was staring out into the rain from inside the academy. He walked up to her. "Are you waiting for the rain to pass?"

She nodded.

"Well, may I offer you my help then?" Michael had said, showing her his umbrella. They ended up walking through the rain together for the three miles that their home was from school. They could have taken the bus, but for some reason, both preferred walking and taking their time on this occasion.

They had talked all the way to Alexis' house, until an uneasy silence fell upon them.

At some point, Alexis had halted. Michael also stopped and made sure the umbrella was covering her.

She had stared at him with those emerald eyes of hers. "I'm sorry, but I'll forever regret this otherwise." she said before she leaned forward and kissed him.

Michael had frozen completely, and when she broke the kiss Alexis stared at him with eyes full of embarrassment and regret.

That's when Michael dropped the umbrella, wrapped his arms around her neck and kissed her back.

They stood there for ages as the rain beat down on them, but neither of them could care less. When they arrived home they were soaked, their parents staring giving them a stare. Michael's parents even scolded him for losing his umbrella, as he had forgotten to pick it back up. Thankfully, Alexis returned it to him the next morning.

They became inseparable, and when Michael reached age 23 he finally had worked up the courage to ask her the big question. She had rocked his world once again by saying yes. And here they were, husband and wife, with an infant child of their own. One that Alexis was currently holding in her arms downstairs. She sat there, stroking her child's ears as she thought of what the future could have in store for her son.

Five hours later, Michael slowly regained consciousness. He yawned as he walked over to his computer to check his mail, and nearly choked on his own saliva when he saw the results of his hard work the night before.

"Lex?"

Alexis came rushing up the stairs. She knew that he loved her name, and that he would only shorten it if he would not have the time to pronounce it fully. "What's wrong?" she asked immediately.

Michael only pointed at the screen. "One million likes, Alexis. One million, for something I only uploaded hours ago."

"My goodness. I don't recall any of your work hitting such a milestone before. No offense, of course."

"I know, and that's why I'm so shocked. I... I... I could sell it for a price per download?"

"Have you claimed the rights?"

"Of course I did, add to that, the track even has my musical signature."

"Your what?"

"When I created this thing's so-called MIDI file, I left an inaudible set of notes spelling 'Starlight'."

Alexis sighed. "Alright then."

Michael sat down behind his computer and added a download to the track at a price of ten bolts per download.

Almost immediately fifty bolts were transferred to his bank account. "Damn." Michael said, watching it happen.

Alexis smiled and let her head rest on her husband's head. "Come, dear. I'll get to making dinner."

"What are you gonna make?"

"Your favorite. It's the least I can do to thank you for giving me the rest I need." she said before going downstairs.

About an hour later Alexis tiredly stepped into bed, as Michael would look after Kaden during the night.

Thus, she nearly jumped when she felt a pair of strong arms wrap around her waist from behind. "Michael? What are you doing here?"

"I'm not going to fall asleep." he said, snuggling up to her. "But I won't leave you 'til you do."

She turned around and let her head rest against her husband's chest. "You could tell I missed this, didn't you?"

"M-hm."

"You're such a sweetheart." she said with a smile as she closed her eyes and slowly began to drift off to the realm of dreams, wrapped in her husband's loving embrace.

* * *

 **Maybe this chapter is a bit on the short side. Truthfully it's proving to be quite difficult to put that much info into these chapters at this point, but I can assure you, dear reader, that chapter length will increase as the story progresses.  
**

 **Also, I wonder, what do you all think that Kaden's parents do for a living? Shoutouts to those who get it right!**

 **By the way, reviewers are most welcome and very much appreciated! Flamers, on the other hand, are not.**

 **Either way, once again, have an awesome day, and I hope to see you all in the next chapter.**


	3. Rendez-Vous

**Whoo, back to updating. Sorry that I've been inactive for so long, folks. I just got a lot of stuff to take care of in real life, leaving me with no time to write at all. Next week I'll have more time to update so expect chapter frequency to increase then. True Heroes is also still on the update list and even Epilogue 3 is getting some love.**

* * *

 **Review replies**

 **bajy: "** ** _I love this chapter!  
it may have been short but otherwise it was great!  
I look forward to reading more soon!_"  
Thank you! I hope you'll enjoy this chapter just as much.**

 **Krulla Chief: "** ** _Just, gonna give you some advice here. If you do review replies, don't actually put the review itself into the story, especially if it's long, because it inflates the word count and that's one of the few things that helps tell if the story is worth reading at times. I, truthfully, really want to see where this story leads. I haven't seen any grammar errors or the like to report to you to fix right now, so nothing to report on there. Honestly, keep on the good work, I really want to see where all of this will lead._ "  
I see your concern. Thing is, with my update schedule there's a big chance people will already have forgotten what they wrote in the first place which is why I'm adding it in for convenience. I'll give it a thought for the next chapter though. It's also reassuring to have an extra pair of eyes on the lookout for the occasional error that manages to slip through, so thank you. I hope this chapter will live up to your expectations.**

 **TheLilyofTheValley: "** ** _This is slowly growing on me. I may end up Favoriting this before it hits five chapters..._**

 _ **I'm glad you still remember me Guardian! I was of the mind that people forgot about me (but that's my fault for not publishing any stories). I hate to sound corrective, (please forgive me if I come off as rude) but the thief actually stole three of my RaC stories. I reported two of them before I did anything else, and by early Saturday afternoon, they had been removed. That was also how I found out how the reporting worked and shared it to Amber.**_

 _ **But enough about me, I need to review this story! This second chapter was beautifully written and I am in love with your versions of Kaden's parents (and Ratchet's grandparents). The chapter flowed smoothly and I loved the word choice throughout it. I'm quite surprised that Michael was an artist, mostly because the Lombaxes are a very technology-driven society (or at least, that is how they are mostly represented). I don't really know what I could guess for what Kaden's parents really do, I'm not the best at guessing...**_

 ** _Great second chapter! Keep up the great work! :)_ "  
Thank you! And of course I remember, I got a pretty good memory I dare say! I still know my way around some cities in Switzerland even though I haven't been there in years... And that's okay, I didn't even know more than one story had been stolen, probably because you were that quick to act. And Kaden's father being an artist... you're _almost_ right. You'll see the answer in this chapter. They're pretty tech-savvy indead but I thought it'd be boring if _all_ of them would be engineers or the like, so they have a variety of jobs. Engineer, cook, architect, train conductor... Thank you once again, here's hoping this chapter lives up to your expectations.**

 **Max Chronicle: "** ** _Sweet chapter bro. (And emphasis on sweet!)  
"To guess or not to guess  
that is the question"  
Answer: I am is not guessing... at all. Am is horrible at it.  
Though do give my congrats to Michael for the one mil.  
(Casually sends ten bolts over... SHUT UP AND TAKE MY BOLTS!)  
Max out.  
P.S. Wow Alexis. Wow._"  
Thanks! And I'm sure Michael will appreciate that support. You'll also find a little elaboration on Alexis' bold move there in this chapter. Thank you once again, and here's hoping it'll live up to your expectations.**

 **Now, without further ado, let's continue the story!**

* * *

"Morning." Michael whispered as he watched Alexis' eyes open.

"Good morning." she replied with a yawn. "Did you hear Kaden?"

"Nope, he didn't wake me up either."

She let out a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness his sleeping pattern is getting more regular."

"Yeah, now I don't have to spend all night staring at a computer screen and only send my team members half-finished stuff."

A month had passed since Michael had written that song that went viral almost immediately. By now it had earned him one hundred thousand bolts and although the hype was dying down, he was thankful for every single bolt.

He had used some of the money to upgrade his computer's hardware to make better products, especially a soundcard upgrade was a must. They had saved half of the money on a bank account that they had set up for Kaden for his education, and perhaps to help afford his flying lessons, and the rest they had saved on their own bank account for future use.

Michael had tried making two other songs, but neither had become as popular as that one critically-acclaimed song that went viral.

Michael was awakened from his train of thoughts about the past month when he vaguely heard Alexis ask him something. "Helloooo, Fastoon to Michael, do you copy?"

He laughed. "Sorry, dear. I suppose my mind drifted off for a moment. What did you want to ask me?"

"I was wondering if there's anything you have to do today."

"Well... I was gonna meet up with the boys this afternoon, you know, we meet-"

"Meet in person every month to discuss ideas, I know." she said. "I was asking because I wanted to go do something with you and Kaden."

"Oh? What did you want to do?"

"I don't know yet, I was also wondering if you had any ideas." she said, snuggling up to him.

"Uuh... not right now, maybe something will pop into my head later. How about we go tomorrow? I'll make sure to finish my work for tomorrow today instead."

"That'd be wonderful, just, please don't work _too_ hard, you know? Now that you're finally no longer a zombie during the day, I don't want you being a zombie again tomorrow because you pushed yourself too hard."

"I'll be fine." he replied with a smile. Then his smile faded. "Dear, I've been thinking about something."

"What is it?" she asked.

"Our first kiss... that was probably the boldest thing you could possibly have done, I..."

She smiled. "Michael, are you happy?"

"Yes, of course I am."

"Do you love me?"

"More than anything, dear."

"Do you love our son?"

"I'd give my life for him."

"Then you have nothing to worry about." she said with a laugh. "We've been together for a decade now, and that spark still hasn't vanished. If it has survived this long, then it's not going to die out anytime soon."

"But I still catch myself wondering-"

"Wanna know why I did it?" she asked. Michael nodded.

She sighed. "It actually surprises me that you don't ask me this until well over a decade."

"Why would I? Being in the present with you was much more fun than dwelling in the past, but now... now that we have a son, I feel like it's my responsibility to think of both the past and future. I just can't stop doing it."

"Well... you certainly were surprised by that action of mine, eh?"

Michael nodded.

"Well... so was I, to be honest. I had no idea what washed over me there and then, but it was like as if something deep inside me, some kind of strange energy that I felt surge through my heart, took control. It was as if something deep inside me suddenly screamed 'now'. I just kinda lost control - I liked you so much and still do to this day."

Michael laughed. "I suppose I can now finally say that the ladies threw themselves at me when I was younger, or one did at least."

"You know it." she said, pinching his left cheek. "Come on, let's go eat something."

* * *

"Be safe out there." Alexis said before giving her husband a kiss on the cheek.

"I'll be fine." Michael said, returning the favor before putting on his coat and wrapping a scarf around his neck. He re-adjusted his glasses and checked himself in the mirror one final time before he stepped out the door. He waved Alexia goodbye over his shoulder until the house got out of sight as he walked to the train station downtown.

He took a detour through the marketplace, the smells of fresh food and various exotic spices flooding the air until it got almost overwhelming. Despite that, it still made him smile.

When he reached the train station, he walked to a ticket dispenser and took place in line. After five minutes it was his turn. Inserting his credit card into the designated slot, Michael typed on the console and a few seconds later his train tickets came rolling out. Taking both his credit card and tickets he hurried to the train platform and stepped into a train wagon just in time before the doors closed behind him. He sat down in a seat near the window on the upper deck of the dual-deck train and stared out the window as the train platform began to move.

Although Grav-Trains were already a reality, they were still rather expensive, thus creating a Grav-Train network was slow. Therefore Michael had to take a normal, dual-railed train instead of the mono-railed Grav-Train, and switch to the more futuristic cousin later.

He stared as the forests of Fastoon zipped past the window before the train entered a long tunnel through a mountain.

Reaching into his brown-leather bag, he pulled out a book and began to read, the lamps built into the wooden ceiling of the train's nostalgia-inducing interior providing enough light for him to make out the words. He only looked up when a brown-furred Lombax in uniform passed by to check his tickets.

After he had read two chapters the train left the tunnel, and he found himself near the shores of Lake Cirrus.

"Next stop: Cirrus City." the speaker system informed. Michael put his book back in his bag and got up, before cautiously making his way to the doors on the lower deck.

As soon as the train had stopped the doors slid open, leaving passengers with two minutes to board and disembark the train. Michael walked into a tunnel leading under the station until he walked back into the light, emerging at the Grav-Train platform. He leaned against a lamppost in the sun as he waited three minutes for the Grav-Train to arrive, and when it did, he boarded the train. He took place in a compartment in the back of the train's third wagon and watched in boyish amazement as the train began to make speed, first slow as the trail passed through the city, winding around the skyscrapers that made up Cirrus City, before leaving the urban environment and heading to the capital of Fastoon – Asfaleia City.

Michael lost himself in the pages of his book again, until he was brought back to reality by a female voice. "Sir? Can I check your train ticket please?"

He looked up. "No way."

He recognized her immediately. Light orange fur with a hint of cream, amber eyes and a smooth voice, along with long brown hair and brown stripes. The woman standing in the entrance of his compartment could not be older than 27, Michael guessed.

"Hello, Michael." Amelia Cross told him with a smile as she readjusted her conductor's hat. Michael smiled when he saw his old classmate. "How have things been for you?" he asked.

"Calm." she replied, leaning against the door frame. "It's a quiet job, train conductor, but it's enough for me for now."

"I always thought you'd become an architect."

"Well, I'm out of money to fund my education, so this is more of a side job to earn some money so I can graduate. So, you're not that far from the truth." she said with a grin. "What about you?"

"Well." Michael said with a proud smile. "Alexis gave birth to a son a month ago."

Amelia gasped and pulled her old classmate into a bear hug with an excited yelp. "Oh, Zoni, I'm so happy for you!"

"Thanks." Michael managed to say despite her crushing grip. She let go immediately. "Whoops, sorry, got a bit carried away there."

"Eh, it's no problem." he said, rubbing his now sore upper arms. "You know, you can always come over. I haven't heard from you in a while as well, did something happen?"

"My phone got stolen, and I was dumb enough to not make backups of my contacts. No worries, I kept no personal data on my phone other than numbers, so no big deal. The Guardsmen are already tracking it down."

"Sad to hear that. Can't you send an E-mail?"

"I don't own any other electronic devices beside that phone." she replied, blushing a little. "I had to sell my laptop to fund my study."

Michael bit his lip, then he made the decision. He would talk to Alexis about it later, but he really wanted to help out his old friend. "You know, why don't you come over next weekend?"

"I got the Sunday shift, so that's gonna be hard. Well, at least one of the perks of this job is that the train you work on is free-of-charge for you to travel with... maybe I could come over Saturday? I'd love to meet your son. And catch up with Alexis of course, last time I saw her was during your wedding, I must admit. Man, I really haven't been in touch, have I?"

"Nope, shame if you ask me. Anyhow, I expect you'll have to get back to your job now, so here's my ticket." he said, taking his train tickets out of his pocket. He handed them to Amelia, who took one ticket from the strip of what had been seven tickets, though now only five remained.

"You know what?" Michael said. "I won't be needing all of them, take one for yourself. They should still work this weekend."

"Thanks a bunch." she said, taking him up on his offer. "But why did you buy seven then?"

"Pack discount, remember? Or weren't you informed that there's currently a discount on packs of tickets? Buying a pack of seven was cheaper than six individual tickets, so I just thought 'well, we take those'."

She laughed. "Well, you're right, I _should_ get back to work. I'll be in touch. Good seeing you, Michael." she said before leaving his compartment. She poked her head back into his vision a second later. "Oh, uh... at what time should I arrive Saturday?"

"Eleven o' clock would be the best time I suppose."

"Alright, see you then!" she said before she disappeared again.

Michael laughed, his eyes wandering from where her head had been to the book in his hands, and as soon as the words entered the vision he found himself being pulled right back into the pages.

Not long after the Grav-Train entered the northern half of Asfaleia City. Michael disembarked the Grav-Train before entering another, normal train that was just entering the station, which would lead him to the section of the city that he needed to be in.

Roughly half an hour later Michael walked down the stairs of the station. Crossing the busy streets, he soon found himself in an area known for it's many restaurants.

Soon enough he found the place where he had spent many hours with his friends back when he was a student – restaurant The Golden Bolt.

He stepped through the doors. Immediately he was overwhelmed by a strong sense of nostalgia. How often his eyes had roamed those dark wooden walls, or the fans hanging from the ceiling. He walked to the table where they always sat when they were young. He noticed his group of friends already waiting for him.

"G'day, Mike!" one of them said with a heavy accent, glancing over his shoulder. Michael smiled, it's been a while since anyone had named him by his student nickname.

"Good day to you too, Chris." he said, sitting down across from his friend. "You don't _ever_ change, do you?"

Chris laughed. "Ya know it, man. Good old student nicknames. Congrats on that song of yours by the way."

"You check my profile?"

"Sure do, it's a better way to stay up-to-date than your E-mails." Chris Smith said with a laugh. How's your progress on the skybox by the way?"

"Eh, not good, man. The baby's been wailing my ears off."

Another friend of Michael burst out laughing. "Oh, it'll be much worse later, trust me. I got a three-year-old daughter running around. Let me tell you, catching a few seconds alone so you can work is really hard."

Michael nodded. "Though, in the end, is it that bad? It's your child after all, Alan." he said before turning to the waiter walking up to their table and ordering a drink.

"Yeah, true. Wouldn't want to waste more than a second of it to be honest, but alas, duty calls." Alan Richards said. "I'm making progress with environment objects, though I can't texture them until _someone_ finishes their work."

"Oh, step off." Sander Everest said, putting down his drink. "You're the egghead that asked for 4K, that's a tall order you know?"

Alan laughed. "Relax, Sander. I was just joking. I know you'll do great if you have some extra time." he said, giving Sander a pat on the shoulder. "Gotta give you credit too, Mike. If there's someone who can keep the hype train going it's you with those images or music of yours."

Michael's drink arrived, and he raised it. "Cheers." he said. "It's good to meet with all of you in person again."

"Well, cheers, mates!" Chris replied. "Though, I could use a hand with the character design – I think we could improve the weapon a little. It looks a bit too... meh. I think we can make it more flashy."

"We don't want to alienate anyone either." Michael said. "That's the reason we have the current design."

"Well, then how about we make both a male and female character?"

"You sure? Wouldn't that take an awful amount of time?"

"Not really, all I gotta do is tweak some scripts a little and add a CSS and it's good to go. As soon as I finished the model though."

"I can make the weapon models if you'd like." Michael offered.

"Heh, do me a favor and leave this to me. You're good, Michael, but you got a son to spend time with. I don't want you blaming yourself for not taking your time with him."

"Thanks, man. I'll just keep working on the environmental textures and the skybox then. Speaking of which, I got a cool idea, what if..."

* * *

Four hours later Michael boarded the Grav-Train back to Cirrus City, from where he would take another train. He noticed Amelia checking tickets aboard another train heading to the largest airport on the planet. She noticed him too and saluted him with a smile before getting back to work.

When he finally arrived back in his hometown, he was exhausted. He made his way to his house and knocked instead of reaching for his keys. Alexis opened the door. "Huh? Did you forget your keys?"

"Just too tired to grab them." he said, wrapping his arms around her neck. "It's good to be back home."

She smiled. "I kinda knew you'd be here at this time, I checked the train schedule online so dinner's almost ready."

"You're unbelievable." he said with a thankful smile.

"I know." she said with a grin as she closed the door behind him.

Michael slowly leaned forward, but before he could kiss her Alexis pressed her left index finger against his lips. "Nu-uh, finish your dinner before you start on the dessert." she said, making Michael chuckle.

After dinner, Alexis and Michael snuggled up on the couch and watched some TV. Michael was trying to focus but his mind was a blur, and Alexis was already dozing off.

They had set up a camera near Kaden so they could keep an eye on him. Michael's smartphone lay on the coffee table, showing a life feed.

Michael suddenly noticed something. Immediately some of the mist in his head cleared as he picked up the phone and stared at the screen. He focused.

After five more minutes, he again noticed a flickering of motion in the corner of Kaden's room. Kaden himself was asleep.

Michael watched where he had seen something move, only to notice a flickering in a different corner.

Michael watched, frozen, as something formed near Kaden's bed in mid-air. As soon as it had started however, it ended. Michael shook his head.

"Is something wrong, dear?" Alexis sleepily asked.

"No, everything's fine." he replied. "Let's just go upstairs." he said, turning off the TV before picking his wife up bridal-style, making Alexis giggle as she let her head rest against his chest.

* * *

 **Okay, you all might be wondering what in the world just happened there with Kaden. Remember what Michael saw, it'll return later on. Much later on.**

 **I'm kinda running low on ideas for the next chapter, so if anyone has some ideas for some funny/adorable baby Kaden moments don't be afraid to let me know!**

 **Then there's Asfaleia City. Gotta give credit, I didn't come up with the name. It's a nod to a story called 'The Second Great War' by Samanan7 and co-written by me. You'll find it on DeviantArt, or the Tumblr set up for it. Just google it and you'll certianly come across it should you want to give it a read.**

 **Until the next chapter, please leave a review! They really help with keeping my motivation up.**

 **Flamers however, beware.**

 **I _devour_ flamers.**

 **(Hopefully) see you all in the next chapter!**


	4. Friends, Family, and Food

**Well, I'm back at last! Sorry for leaving you all waiting for so long, folks. I had to prioritize for a few weeks, school taking central stage. I'm back now though, and ready to continue writing. The next chapter of True Heroes is also nearing completion, so expect that to appear soon as well. Since an amazing new Overwatch event just went live however, 'soon' is probably relative... Nevertheless I'll try to get to work and push out some new chapters ASAP.**

 **Before we move on to the reviews though, there's something else. I see the flamer's back as well. This is no surprise to me, flamers are always so predictable.**

 **Listen, flamer. I think it's beyond adorable that you keep coming back for more, that tells me that there'll always be at least one person reading my stuff no matter what I post, so thank you for that. It's also so amusing to see you struggle like this, you're trying so hard but have no hope of defeating me whatsoever which is cute. We writers honestly laugh at the stupidity of your kind of people, so please keep going and give us all some good laughs. Plus, your insults only keep me more motivated to keep on writing. It's also funny how you keep trying to lower me while I'll always be better than you because I have the guts to get a real account and post my stories out there for the whole world to see and judge. You don't even have the stones to come at me with a _real_ account, thus by trying to lower me you're only lowering yourself. In the words of Zenyatta: "You are your _own_ worst enemy."**

 **Only thing you've done so far is prove to the world that you're pathetic and have absolutely nothing better to do than insulting good people. Do everyone on this website a favor and get a hobby. In case you're gonna ask me the same – you're _reading_ my hobby. My hobby is spending hours of my time trying to entertain others without requiring anything in return, what's yours? Spending hours of your time trying to offend _good_ people with senseless and baseless arguing that can be denied with one press of a button? That's so sad that it's amusing. I actually feel sorry for you.**

 **And as for 'truth hurts', what you're saying doesn't affect me at all because it's not true. A false truth doesn't hurt. Truth probably hurts for you though. Face it, flamer. Nobody on this website likes you. Heck, not even your own _family_ gives a crap about you! If your parents would've cared about you they would've raised you properly! The truth is that you're a sad and pathetic little man with no life – now _that_ 's gotta hurt.**

 **Because you're too weak I'll be the better man and simply straight up deny you from now on. As for you, since you clearly don't have anything better to do feel free to keep flaming and amuse me and my audience (which counts some of the greatest writers in this archive) and humiliate yourself even further.**

 **But more to the point. Do you, tiny, puny,** _ **expendable**_ **little mortal, actually think** _ **you**_ **can convince me to leave?**

 **Now that that swine has been sent back to the basement, let's get to the reviews, shall we? Thank you, reviewers, for your tact by the way, because damn, flamers have one poor set of parents.**

* * *

 **Krulla Chief: "** ** _Well, couple things to say, mostly that I still enjoyed this chapter, and that this story is def worth watching. On the review reply thing, just a warning that if you get enough reviews to a chapter, you might not want to do the replies at the top, because it might annoy some readers. Also, on to flames. Flames are fucking hilarious. They try and sound mean, but since this is the internet, you shouldn't take much of anything seriously on it, like oh my god some of the things they say are hilarious, atleast from what I've read in other stories. On to the story itself, this was really fun, though only a little bit of an idea of where it's going, though I won't share it because it's more fun this way. First run through I didn't catch too many grammar or spelling errors, but next run through I might and I'll PM you them. Either way, keep up the good work._ "  
I hear you there. A good friend of mine, RevenantReaper337, has stories getting so much love that he has switched to answering reviews at the end of the chapter. Perhaps I should do that too. If you find flames enjoyable to read, should I keep you up-to-date? Seeing that this guy going apesh*t on my stuff has no life at all he's bound to come back especially after that roast, and I'd love to keep you posted. Also, want some French fries? Because damn has this guy thrown some salt my way. Let me know if you find an error by the way, thanks! Hope this chapter lives up to your expectations.**

 **bajy: "** ** _This chapter was nice and sweet  
its doing well so far  
what will happen next?  
looking forward to reading more soon!_"  
Thank you! Hope this chapter lives up to your expectations.**

 **Falcy: "** ** _Another well written chapter, TWG. Keep it up!_**

 _ **P.S. Whatever appeared to Kaden, I have a feeling things won't look well for Michael...**_  
 _ **P.S.S. Even though the Switch has some problems, the games shown for it were pretty exciting, like Splatoon 2!(Although it's releasing in June...yet there's the global testfire to consider)**_  
 ** _P.S.S.S. Y'know, I'm kinda curious; what made you inspired to write amazing stories such as the Epilogue series?_ "  
Thank you! And I certainly will!  
P.S. You'll have to wait and see.  
P.S.S. Indeed, it has some pretty amazing games. Creators are certainly coming up with cool concepts for such an unusually-designed console.  
P.S.S.S. I... I don't even know. I just came up with it, and came up with a lot of stuff on the go as well. Photon wasn't even planned for the storyline at first, but he turned out as a massive success! Thank you once again, and I hope this chapter will live up to your expectations.**

 **TheLilyoftheValley: "** ** _Nice world-building chapter! Especially since we got some more information of Kaden's parents and Angela's grandma. As for what happened with Kaden... One of your OCs! A grey Lombax assassin! A specific Zoni creature that will remain unnamed just in case I am right in my guesses! (Now that would be awkward)_**

 _ **Also I'll probably check out that other story on Archieve of Our Own when I get the time. It sounds interesting and I'll see if I can give it some reviews.**_

 ** _Great chapter! I can't wait for the next one! :)_ "  
Thank you! And you'll certainly be surprised when I reveal what happened there. I've noted your suggestions and will use them with lots of thanks. And I think you're enjoying the story on AOO! I hope you'll enjoy this chapter just as much.**

 **Max Chronicle: "** ** _It's the Zoni!  
Of this I'm SOOOOOOO sure!  
But hey, they only mean well so I'm not going to freak out about it.  
Sorry, I don't have any ideas for Kaden... but maybe one will come.  
(Laughs) "The boys" as Michael so puts it. Hilarious and there should be more of them.  
(Cheers) And let's not forget Amelia, we should have more of her too. In other words, more family, the better.  
Max out._"  
Hmm... we'll see if you're right, in time (Pun definitely intended). Right now I plan for them to be a small coding team but it's a concept I can expand on further. I'm glad you like the fact that I added some family members for canon characters, and I hope you'll enjoy this chapter as well!**

* * *

"You got everything?" Michael asked his wife as he grabbed the last bag.

"Yep, we're all set." Alexis said, who was standing by their ship. "Let's check one more time... spare diapers, food, medical supplies just in case... we're good. Let's go." she said, going inside to get Kaden before climbing into their ship, named 'Perihelion'.

Michael placed the last bag in the cargo area and closed it off. He then went back inside and checked that all electronic devices were turned off before leaving the house and locking the door, and climbing into the pilot's seat.

After closing the cockpit he entered the coordinates, and immediately Perihelion's engines flared to life.

Michael skillfully flew the ship off the ground and out of the dusty blue atmosphere of Fastoon.

It truly was a wonderful planet, Michael thought to himself as the blue began to fade into gold as they left the atmosphere, before making way for the deep blue hue of Polaris Galaxy.

"How's Kaden doing?" Michael asked as he began to enter the warp drive data.

"He's not troubled at all. Instead he seems fascinated by space." Alexis replied, watching as her son's emerald eyes darted across the stars, not knowing which one he liked the most.

She wondered if her son was even aware of what he was seeing – if he could already comprehend that he was looking at a distant object, not a disembodied light source.

As Michael finished entering the coordinates, Perihelion began to rumble as the warp drive began to build up energy, preparing to break the boundaries of physics.

Alexis watched as a frown formed on Kaden's tiny face before he began to cry. She laughed. "Oh, dear. Seems Kaden's no fan of warp drives."

"Can't blame him, how the ship growls and shudders like this – I found it scary at first too, it was like the ship was preparing to destroy itself."

They engaged the warp drive, the ship suddenly entering a green vortex. Alexis could see the bright green glow reflected in her son's eyes, who had calmed and was staring out the window with those big eyes of his.

They exited warp a minute later, and Perihelion was suddenly hovering over a bright blue planet. Entering the atmosphere of planet Mukow, Michael steered the ship to a specific island. Soon enough their destination came into view.

Built on a remote island was one of Polaris' largest zoos. Landing in the park's hangar, they disembarked their ship. Michael took his shoulder bag out of the cargo space before he locked their ship.

They walked through a short tunnel into the daylight. When they arrived at the entrance to the zoo, Alexis sat down on a bench while Michael went to purchase two tickets – it was free for infants.

Ten minutes later they walked into the park. For hours they walked around, making memories with Kaden while Michael made sure to put his camera to good use. One highlight of the day was when Kaden seemed to be holding a staring contest with a Grelbinian dolphin.

They had lunch at the park before going home. When they arrived back home however, Michael lay down on the couch and closed his eyes.

"You okay?"

"Hm." he groaned. "Headache."

"Oh, hang on." Alexis said, running upstairs and laying Kaden down on his bed, before rushing into the bathroom to get some painkillers.

"Here." She said, handing two tablets to Michael before walking into the kitchen.

"What kind of painkiller is this?"

"Paracetamol. That should do the trick." she said, walking over to him with a glass of water. "Here." she said, handing him the glass.

"Thank you." Michael said with a smile. "You're incredible."

"I know." she said with a smile, running a hand through his headfur. "Everything else feeling alright? I mean, you're not nauseous?"

"Nope. Just tired is all."

"You hungry?"

"Not really."

"Hm." she said. "Maybe you should just head to bed then."

"Alright then." he said, getting up and giving his wife a pat on the back. "Thanks, sweetheart."

"Anytime." she said before giving him a kiss on the cheek. "Goodnight, dear. I'll look after our son."

* * *

"Alright, at what time is Amelia coming over?" Alexis asked. She had been surprised at first when Michael had invited someone over without talking to her about it first, but when he told her who it was she was okay with it immediately. She hadn't seen Michael's old classmate in a while either, and she understood why he made the decision to invite her. Thus she was completely fine with it.

"Eleven." Michael said, who was vacuum cleaning the floor and furniture.

"So she should be here any second now?"

"Yep." Michael said, who turned off the vacuum cleaner. The doorbell rang three minutes later.

Michael opened the door, and immediately a pair of orange-furred arms wrapped around his neck. "Michael! It's so good to see you!" Amelia excitedly cried out.

"Great to see you too, Ames." he replied. "Please, come on in."

"Hello Amelia! Still as excited as always, huh?" Alexis said, who came walking over with a smile.

"You know it." Amelia said, giving Alexis a hug as well. "Oh, I'm so happy for you, girl!"

"Thanks!" Alexis replied. "You know, I wonder when you'll have a kid of your own."

Amelia shrugged. "Gotta find _the one_ first. If I ever do."

"You will. Believe me, you will." Michael said, giving her a pat on the back. "Well, anything I can offer you? Coffee, tea?"

"Tea would be just fine, thank you." she replied, sitting down on the couch. While Michael made some tea, Alexis went upstairs to get Kaden.

"Here you go." Michael said, pouring his old friend a cup of tea.

"Thank you." she replied. "Sooo... did you two decide on having a kid after a long conversation, or...?"

"We did talk about it. Both of us wanted a child of our own, but we wanted to make sure we would both be ready. Remember Dustsqueaker?"

"That little pet of yours that you had at the academy? Of course I do, she was so cute! Where is she by the way?"

"In the backyard." Michael said with an emotionless expression.

"Oh..." Amelia said, ears lowering. "I'm sorry for your loss."

"Hey." he said. "It's okay. She passed away three months ago, but by that time she was already pretty much ancient, for her species at least. Usually animals of her kind don't grow older than eight, but she grew to be seventeen years old. Point is, Dustsqueaker was my way of getting used to having to care for something. A pet is in no way comparable to a child, but still."

"I get what you mean." Amelia said. At that moment they heard footsteps coming down the stairs. "Oh, will you look at that!"

Alexis came walking over with a white bundle in her arms, with two golden ears sticking out. She sat down on the couch next to Amelia. "Please put your tea away for a moment."

"Oh, of course." Amelia said, putting it down on the coffee table.

The peeked into the bundle. "Yep, I definitely recognize those eyes. He's got your eyes and Michael's fur."

"Well spotted." Alexis said with a proud smile.

"Can... can I hold him for a moment?" Amelia shyly asked.

"Sure, just be careful with him." Alexis said, handing her Kaden.

Amelia stared at Kaden, and Kaden stared back. "Wow." she muttered. "So this is what it's like to hold an infant. I'm too afraid to make any kind of move out of fear that I'd hurt the child."

Alexis carefully took her son back. "Better?"

"Yeah" Amelia said with a sigh of relief. "It's so wonderful yet frightening to hold something so... fragile."

"Amelia, do you want to have kids of your own one day?" Michael asked out of the blue.

"Huh? Yeah, I'd love to have a daughter. Just have to find the right guy."

Michael nodded. "Hey, I'm sorry about all the bad luck you've been having. Although a conductor's outfit looks good on you, it's not what makes you happy."

He smiled before handing her a piece of paper. "Here. Head to the bank with this to turn it into bolts."

Amelia eyed the sum on the paper. "O-Oh my god..."

"That should be enough to get you through your education process."

"I... I... I can't possibly accept this."

"Michael and I both agree you should." Alexis said. "Fastoon could use an architect like you. You've got a good set of brains, Amelia. Time to give them a challenge, don't you think?"

"How come you two can even afford this?" Amelia asked, flabbergasted. "Alexis, you're off-work to spend time with Kaden, and Michael, the game you've been working on isn't even out yet!"

"Well, one night I wrote a soundtrack for the game that, when I uploaded it, went absolutely viral. I added a download with a price tag and boom, easy income. It didn't last long but it was quite a lot of financial and emotional support. We'd love to share some with a friend in need."

"I... I... thank you, thank you both so much!"

When Amelia left that afternoon however, she said something strange. She stared at Kaden for a moment before she left, saying "You'll do great things, Kaden. Very great things. I just know it."

"What was that about?" Michael wondered out loud after Amelia had left.

"I have no idea." Alexis replied.

* * *

The months after Amelia had visited went by in a blur. Michael made lots of progress with his part of the game, creating several high-quality skyboxes. From a nighttime skybox with billions of stars visible in a galaxy-like formation (which he had created using imagery of professional telescopes that he found online) to a cloudy, daytime sky.

One day, he was busy rendering a planet when Alexis came in, Kaden in her arms. "Hey." she said.

"Hey." he replied, taking off his headset.

"Just here to see how you're doing." she said.

"Everything's going a-okay here. Check it out - the final planet in the game. I still have to come up with a good name though."

Kaden stared at the planet on-screen.

"Ila-sie!"

Both parents' jaws dropped. "Did you say something, little one?" Michael asked, taking a good look at his son. "Ila-sie!" Kaden repeated.

"...Bloody brilliant." Michael whispered. "Illusion."

"But what does he mean by it?"

"I think he just likes the sound of it, or that's what he thought of when he saw this planet. Either way, brilliant name, kiddo!" he said with a laugh, stroking his son's left ear.

"And what's my name?" Alexis asked her son. If she had had a tail, it would be swaying excitedly.

"Ma-mi." Kaden said with that high-pitched baby voice of his.

Alexis just stared at him, before she began to laugh and hugged her son. Michael was quick to turn it into a group hug.

"Oh, I love you two." she mumbled.

* * *

It wasn't long until Kaden began to crawl, and would jump to solid-ish food. They were quick to discover that Kaden was not a fan of spinach, however.

"Come on, little buddy." Michael said to his son as Alexis held a spoon full of spinach in front of Kaden's mouth.

"Iz bad!"

"I know it may not be the best taste in the world, but it's good for you."

"Bah!"

Michael sighed and tiredly rubbed his eyes. "I wonder if I ever was as stubborn as this."

"We probably all were at some point." Alexis said before she had an idea. "Hey Kaden. You like spaceships, right?"

"Are gud!" Kaden said excitedly.

"Well, I got a spaceship right here that needs to land." Alexis said, nodding to the spoon in her hand.

"Hm..." Kaden moaned.

"It needs to land, Kaden. You know they can't fly forever."

"Hm-m."

Alexis began to move the spoon. "Oh, no, it's gonna crash!"

Kaden suddenly leaned forward, the spoon disappearing into his mouth. "Well done, Kaden!" Michael said.

"See? That wasn't so ba-" Alexis began before something happened.

"Bwleh!"

Kaden spat the spinach back out, unintentionally painting his mother green.

"Eugh!" Alexis said with disgust, ears lowering. She glared daggers at Michael. "Don't you dare to laugh."

"Hey, hey, relax! What happened to you gotta be disgusting as heck! I'm not gonna laugh."

"Thanks." she said. "I'm gonna take a shower and hope I don't smell like spinach afterwards. Will you please feed our little troublemaker here?"

"Aye aye, ma'am." Michael said as Alexis left, taking the spoon and scooping up some carrots. "These ones suit your taste better, eh?" he said to his son. "But in all seriousness, you can't go spraying spinach over your mother. You gotta eat it one day."

"I don wanna!"

"Kaden." Michael said with a sigh. "Listen. You're a Lombax, and do you know what they say about Lombaxes?"

"Ano."

"They never run." Michael said with a smile. "Lombaxes are very brave and strong, and so are you, kiddo."

Then Michael had an idea. He placed his hands over his face.

"Dada? Where go?"

"Boo!" Michael said, moving his hands away. Kaden tilted his head in confusion. "See? Most kids would jump but you don't."

Kaden seemed puzzled. Michael shrugged, it was enough. He picked up Kaden and put him down on the ground. "Go play, kiddo. I'll clean up here."

Michael sighed when Kaden crawled off. Lombaxes grow up too fast.

* * *

 **Alright, now that the rough school-weather is over I shall be increasing the chapter frequency as much as I can. The next chapter is already in development and True Heroes' next addition to the storyline shouldn't take long to finish either.  
**

 **I hope to see you all in the next chapter. Until then, please leave a review, they help keeping me motivated and I really enjoy reading them. I even enjoy reading flames, jelousy is easy to take as flattery. Speaking of which, I'm signing off now as I still have to clean up the salt that last flamer left. Speaking of which, anyone want some fries?**

 **-TWG**


	5. Duty (Re)calls

**Howdy, it sure has been a while, hasn't it? A lot has happened in my life since the last chapter, enough for me to write a book about but I'm not gonna tire all of you with that, let's get straight to the chapter.**

 **One thing I want to mention is I'm taking Krulla Chief's advice and will, from now on, be doing the review replies at the end of chapters. So, if you want to see what I wrote in response to your reviews, you'll see at the end of the chapters from now on. This way you can all get to the story sooner.**

* * *

Michael twisted and turned but found himself unable to catch any sleep, even though his wife was sleeping peacefully next to him.

Eventually he gave up and stared at the ceiling. Time had gone by in an absolute blur, it seemed only yesterday that Kaden had covered Alexis in spinach, even though it had in fact been seven years ago.

Michael decided to recap the events of the past years, hoping that sleep would eventually take over.

" _Kaden's first steps... boy, was that a day._ "

* * *

Michael was hard at work coding an audio listener when he heard a loud thud. Immediately he felt nauseous. He got up and ran into Kaden's room, where he found the two-year-old toddler staring at a toy lying on the ground in confusion. "It must've fallen off the shelf." Michael mumbled, picking up the wooden cart and putting it back on it's wheels. Then he realized something. "But how did you reach up there?" he said, looking at his son. Kaden only stared back with those emerald eyes of his.

Michael sat down in a chair in the corner of the green-colored room, and carefully observed his son.

Kaden wasn't doing anything extraordinary, and for half an hour Michael watched how his son mindlessly crawled through the room, occasionally marveled by his own bed, talking unrecognizable words. Michael could not suppress a proud smile, and after half an hour he tiredly stood up.

He kept watching his son until he had reached the door and had to redirect his attention to finding the handle. As soon as his hand rested on the handle however, he stopped. He felt how something grabbed his right leg.

His eyes shot down immediately, and the expression on the face of his child confirmed what he had felt when Kaden grabbed him.

Michael read a mixed expression, part curiosity and wonder, and part fear and insecurity, though neither his son's face nor the tiny hands holding on to his leg for dear life caught his attention as much as Kaden's feet did, or rather, the fact that his child was standing on two legs.

" _Or at least he tried to._ "

Michael knelt down next to his son. "Lex!" he roared over his shoulder as loud as he could manage, she couldn't miss this. Almost instantly Alexis came charging up the stairs, almost tripping over her own feet, as she raced to her husband and child.

"What?!" she asked when she stormed into the room. She found Michael on his knees, eyes, and his arms wrapped around their child's shoulders, as tears ran down his cheeks. "What?!" she asked again. Michael opened his eyes and looked at her, and in his eyes she read no sorrow, but indescribable joy and pride instead. "Our son walks." he whispered, unable to produce anything louder due to the sheer emotion.

Alexis fell to her knees. "Oh, Kaden." she whispered as she wrapped her arms around her son, tears of pride forming in her eyes as well. "I'm so very, very proud of you."

* * *

" _Certainly a day worth reliving._ " he thought, stretching his arms as Alexis rolled around in her sleep. " _But so was Kaden getting his first teeth..._ "

* * *

"Any progress on the EventSubscriber, Mike?" Chris asked over the video call Michael kept active on a second monitor.

"I just have to debug a few enumparsers and we're all set. Or at least we should be." Michael replied. "How's the physics engine coming along?"

"Finished it two days ago. It's quite ingenious, using a boolean-based system. Just add a custom script to an object with physics and it'll automatically react to it's environment using triggercolliders. Now I just got to work out the kinks, I've been getting some nullrefs although the cases may not be linked. I suspect it's an audioloader integration issue. Sander sent over some pretty epic textures by the way. It's something he'll use for the water shaders, in shallow water the waves are minimal and a foam texture is used instead. Speaking of shaders, Alan has finished the atmo shaders and has published the source code on our shared drive. Make sure you grab a copy so you can keep an eye on reflections. Sander is already integrating it with the shaders he made."

"Seems like we're getting close to launch day!" Michael said excitedly. "Any bugs you want me to squash?"

"Uuh... you know networking?"

"Nope."

"Then me and Alan will tackle multiplayer functions, you worry about your kid. I reckon he's grown a lot by now?"

"You guessed it." Michael said, setting up the materials system to work with his new logging system. "Almost too fast really. I suspect Alexis is either already feeding him or about to. We're still testing what vegetables he prefers and downright hates. Spinach is a no-go, but he seems to be okay with carrots."

"Can't blame him. Bloody snottery muck..."

Michael laughed. "Ooh, you'll be surprised. Alexis tried something one day - it was amazing. I advised her to write down the recipe and publish it.

"And?"

"Not sure what she'll do with it. Not my problem either, I my worry is getting this game out the door before we get into financial trouble."

Chris frowned. "Whaddaya mean? Did ya waste all that money you earned with that track?"

"No, of course not, but we put that aside for Kaden's study. We've still got more than enough for an extra year thankfully, but the sooner we get this game out there the better. I just can't help but worry that it won't sell."

Chris chuckled. "Trust me, it will. The graphics are other-worldly I dare say, the story has been looked over by a bunch of writers that I know so the plot is pretty solid, the music's epic - this'll work. Since we're doing everything from scratch we're already one heck of a lot better than a majority of the gaming industry - people that grab assets from the holonet, tape them together with a free engine and add just enough poorly-written code for the 'game' to not piss itself immediately then kick it out the door. No, this'll work. And if it doesn't we could always sell the shaders, or rebuild it to a game-creation engine. The least we can do is make sure our efforts are used wisely."

Michael nodded. "I won't have as much time to work on the game as before sadly, Cobalia's been hit with a bunch of cyber attacks targeting the gel plants. Synergy Securities has tasked me and a bunch of other coders with supporting the local IT-experts."

"Pissin' hackers." Chris said with a sigh.

"Why would anyone hack a gel plant?" Michael wondered out loud. "What possible profit is there? Crude gel is practically worthless when it comes to applying it, it has to be processed first... I just can't get myself to believe that this attack was serious. Almost like it's nothing more than a warming up."

"Could be. Your best bet would be rebooting the system."

Michael laughed. "You know damn well that that won't make stuff better."

"True, but if you can remotely monitor the statup sector you can figure out the source of the intrusion and eliminate it, or at least block the process long enough to fix the loophole granting it access. Make sure that, whatever you find, you warn the authorities - if what you're thinking is right then it could be that this is nothing more than testing a loophole to see what access it gives. Anyhow, I gotta hang up. Isabelle thinks I don't know that she's planning a romantic dinner. Least I can do is play along for her sake, eh? Might as well make her day."

"You're a good man, Chris. Talk to you soon."

"You too, Mike. Cheers." Chris said, saluting his old friend before ending the video call.

Michael began to make some adjustments to the game over system when he heard a loud yelp coming from downstairs.

He instantly got up and charged out of his room, slamming his left foot into his desk in the process but he didn't feel it. The only thing on his mind was his family.

"Lex!" he yelled as he jumped over the railing, landing on all fours and immediately searching for his wife.

He slowly got up, eyebrows raised in confusion and worry leaving his mind as he saw Alexis sit at the kitchen table, holding their son's mouth open with her index fingers.

"The hell happened?" Michael asked, walking over.

"Is... is that what I think it is?" Alexis said. Michael moved over to her so he could see what she was looking at. He noticed it too. Among the pinkish red was a vague blob of white.

Kaden's first teeth were coming.

"Y-You're right..." Michael stammered. "Our son is getting his first teeth!"

Alexis laughed and wrapped her arms around Michael's neck before kissing him passionately. "I love you."

"Love you too. Though... I did hit my foot pretty hard on my way downstairs, could you help me sit down?"

Alexis nodded and escorted her husband to the couch. She went to pick up Kaden before sitting down next to him. "You know... I'm thinking of picking up my job again."

"Just a little longer, Alexis. The game is almost finished."

She laughed. "I know, I know, this has nothing to do with finances. I _want_ to work, not because I dislike being here with you and Kaden, but because I'm getting a bit tired of doing nothing."

Her eyes widened a little. "Wow. Okay, that was probably the weirdest sentence ever, getting tired of doing nothing."

Michael laughed. "I get what you mean. I'll support whatever you decide."

"Thanks." she replied, smiling. "Also, check it out - the guy they hired to fall in for me is an absolute buffoon.

She turned on the television and switched to channel 1, where the news was about to begin.

Michael stared at the screen in disbelief as the host tried to tell the news only to interrupt himself several times. "Inconsistency grew a pair of legs." he mumbled to his wife, who burst out laughing.

Then her eyes narrowed. "There's another reason I want to get back to work. I've been informed by a friend of mine working on the cameras that this moron, this absolute pile of trash right here, is trying to get the job permanently by spreading lies about me."

Michael felt the fire of rage light in his heart. "Okay, now I feel like giving him a reason to stutter."

Alexis kissed him on the cheek. "Calm, dear. I'll deal with this situation, you go work on that game."

* * *

" _Note to self since then: Kaden doesn't like most vegetables. Fruits are, thankfully, okay._ " Michael thought with a chuckle. He glanced at his wife over his shoulder. " _But oh, did Alexis make a show._ "

* * *

"Promise me you'll watch." Alexis said as she wrapped a scarf around her neck before grabbing her shoulder bag.

Michael laughed, holding Kaden. "I wouldn't ever want to miss it. I'll be watching, dear."

Alexis nodded, gave Michael one last kiss, and walked out the door. A few minutes later, she flew off in their ship, 'Starchild'.

Michael began to make dinner for himself and Kaden and, after sharing a meal with his infant son, he sat down on the couch with his child in his arms, waiting for the news.

When it began, he saw the same egghead on screen - the Markazian filling in for Alexis. Greasy black hair in a crew cut covered his head, and a suit and tie completed the picture. And, as Michael expected, the Markazian (going by the name of Phil Revald) began stammering. Michael wondered why Phil still had his job even though he was continuously interrupting himself. It was impossible to make sense of the flood of words coming from his mouth and even if you could make out what he was saying, it was still bullcrap as he hadn't read his script once.

"And then, they gacked the hel plant- uh, hacked the gel plant."

Phil stopped when he heard slow clapping, and Michael smiled when Alexis came walking into view. "Decent, but try and keep up." she said before turning to the camera. "Boiled down, folks, various gelatonium plants on planet Cobalia have been hit by a series of hacks. Local authorities are working hard with Fastoonian software engineers to solve this problem as soon as possible, but so far it is known only that the computer systems are on lockdown. Whoever is behind this has made no statements regarding terms and slash or conditions regarding releasing the lock on the systems, leaving criminal psychologists puzzled."

She turned to Phil. "Your move."

Phil, quite overrun by Alexis' sudden appearance, unleashed another stammering torrent of words, more than half of them 'uh'.

Michael laughed. "Go get 'em, dear."

After three minutes Alexis shut him up. "Leave this to a professional." she mumbled as she took center stage again. "Racing fans all across Fastoon and all nearby sectors are preparing for what appears to be the local racing event of the decade, as various intergalactic racing teams prepare to face off at the Lior Canyons. Fastoontian authorities are hard at work preparing the location for the racing event, with thousands of viewing spots available to the public. Ticket sales are on fire, and it won't be long until the event is entirely sold out. Tomorrow we'll have one of the racers on the show, so be sure to tune in."

Phil began trying to explain the next subject, and when he finally shut up Alexis rolled her eyes. "Seven minutes instead of fourteen, you're improving. My turn."

She cleared her throat. "A heist on Igliak as left authorities baffled, as nothing appears to have been stolen. This event has not only lead to language experts debating whether or not this is truly a 'heist', but has also lead to the museum in question increasing their security measures. Nearby residents are advised to keep their eyes open for suspicious behavior. The Polaris Defense Force urges anyone who has more information or who has seen something to inform their nearest police station immediately."

"Will you quit it?" Phil suddenly asked.

"Quit what? My job? Yeah, you'd really want that, wouldn't you? With how you've been slandering me." Alexis calmly returned with a raised eyebrow.

"What?! That accusation is ridiculous!"

Alexis showed a stack of papers several inches tall and dropped it on the desk with a loud thud. "Here is a full list of all the lies you have spread about me, signed by several witnesses."

She leaned forward. "You know, people think becoming a mother is one of the most wonderful things in life, and I can safely say it is. But it definitely becomes a whole lot more sour when you find out some third-rate buffoon has been hired to take your place and is actively trying to get you fired with lies and baseless speculation. I'm honestly wondering, when spreading those lies, do you also stammer as much as you do on the news? Probably not because then this stack of paper would be three times as tall and primarily feature the word 'uh'."

Phil opened his mouth, but Alexis interrupted him. "Keep it short for once, Phil. You've wasted more than enough of people's time. In fact several shows have been canceled these past few months simply because you took twenty minutes to explain something that a real reporter can do in five." Alexis said before acting as if she was dropping an invisible microphone while giving Phil an expression of steel.

"Why, how dare you-"

"Time limits, Phil. It's all written down. Besides, I'm certain the millions of people watching the show right now are all fed up with you. In fact, since you took over view rates have dropped by 68%, mostly because you're too incompetent to finish a sentence and instead seem to be hellbent on interrupting yourself at least seven times per sentence. And then _you_ still have the nerve to discredit _me_."

Phil laughed nervously. "It doesn't matter! No way you're not fired after this stunt!"

"For what?" Alexis asked calmly. "This broadcast has attracted more viewers than all of _yours_ combined. That's a year-and-a-half of news broadcasts."

Phil stayed silent.

"You don't get it, do you?" Alexis asked calmly before raising her voice. "GET OFF MY STAGE!"

Phil fell off his seat and got off-camera as fast as he could.

Alexis immediately calmed. "Sorry for that, dear viewers. And by that I mean the past year-and-a-half of stammering and wasting of precious time. Either way, that's it for today. Tomorrow we'll have a racer on the show and we may even have a software expert here to talk about the hack on Cobalia. This was definitely the craziest Cerullean 1 News. Have a good evening!"

Alexis kept her attention on the technician in the corner of her eye until he signaled that the cameras were offline.

Immediately the director appeared. "Starlight, I need to have a word with you."

An hour later Alexis arrived back home. "And?" Michael asked immediately.

"I won't be doing the news anymore." she said without an emotion in her voice

Michael's ears lowered. "I'm so sorry for y-"

"I've got my own show as well!" she cried out, wrapping her arms around her husband's neck. "The ratings were through the roof, more than the channel has had in years!"

* * *

Michael turned around again, still getting no sleep. " _That next day was pretty intense as well. That hack on Cobalia..._ "

* * *

"I'll be back home ASAP." Michael said over his shoulder as he grabbed his coat. "I don't plan on hanging around on Cobalia all day."

"Alright! Just make sure you're home before I have to leave, which is around five P.M."

"Got it!" Michael said before walking out the door.

He put his backpack in the trunk of Starchild before taking place in the cockpit. He steered the ship up and away from Fastoon, entering the coordinates of planet Cobalia. Since both planets were in the Cerullean sector, the flight there would only take a few minutes.

Michael activated the warp drive, and his ship entered a green vortex. He closed his eyes and laid back in his seat as his ship cruised though hyperspace. He caught himself wondering how a warp drive even worked.

When the ship began to shudder upon exiting warp, he reopened his eyes and steered his ship down to the largest gel plant on Cobalia, where he had decided to meet up with his colleagues.

After landing and meeting up with his fellow coders, they headed into the facility. Fortunately the facility was run by a single computer system - a server, that had been hacked. Michael grabbed his laptop, connected it to the mainframe, and got to work. Two hours later the problem was resolved. They were thanked several times before one of Michael's colleagues sent the fix to all infected systems on the planet, effectively eliminating the problem.

Though something wasn't right. Michael could feel it. After saying goodbye to his co-workers, Michael did not head back to his ship. Instead he walked to the control room of the spaceport. "Excuse me." he said, knocking on the door. "Digital security, here's my card, you can trace it if you'd like. I just have a single question - what operating system and what version of it are your computers running?"

After digitally confirming that Michael was legit, they answered his question, and Michael's ears lowered. "No. That means you've got the exact same problem as those gel plants. Gentlemen, I believe your computer systems are at risk."

"How can we know that you're not going to install malicious software?" One of the men operating the control room asked.

"Good question, how do I prove that?" Michael mumbled to himself, rubbing his chin in thought. Then he had an idea. "Call the number on my card, Synergy Securities. They can vouch for me."

And indeed, they called the number. The operator confirmed that Michael had business on Cobalia but had nothing to do with air traffic control.

"Allow me to explain." Michael said, making sure the operator could hear it. "The problems at those gel plants were the result of an intrusion through a loophole in the software. The air control software on Cobalia is the exact same version and thus has the same flaw. I think that the attack on the gel plants was nothing more than preparation, an experiment so to speak. The real target is traffic control. It'd disable travel to and from the planet. Regardless no chances should be taken here."

"He's right." a voice said behind Michael. An old Kerwanian came walking in. His fur had become dull grey, but the man still radiated an aura of wisdom.

"Who are you?" one of the control center's crew asked.

The elderly man asked. "I'm surprised you haven't heard of me. You must be new then."

The crewmember nodded. "Mo Sprocket's the name." the elderly man said.

"Mo?"

"Moterno." the elderly man clarified with a roll of his eyes. "I'm a well-known engineer and also the one hired to check up on the air traffic systems. You're right, Lombax. After that intrusion began, I decided to go search for the cause myself, and what do you know. So, would you please give me a hand on fixing these computer systems before anyone can misuse the software?"

"Of course." Michael said, and after a few minutes they got to work.

When Michael was done he said goodbye to Moterno and he was about to start his ship and fly off when he received a call from his wife. Patching it through to the dashboard console, her face appeared on-screen a few seconds later.

"Yes, dear?" Michael asked as he started up his ship's systems.

"I thought you promised to be home by now?"

"I'm sorry, honey, but I discovered something critical. I think I just saved thousands of lives."

"You WHAT?!" she shouted in disbelief.

"The hack of those gel plants was by taking advantage of a software loophole. Getting rid of the issue was pretty easy, but there was something off. Why hack a gel plant?"

"I have a feeling you're about to tell me why."

Michael laughed. "Score, sweetheart. I discovered that the air traffic control on Cobalia uses the same software, and thus has the same loophole. I'm willing to bet my entire capital that this gel plant intrusion was nothing more than a test, and that air traffic control was the real target all along."

Alexis bit her lip. "Michael, is there something you could do for me?"

"Anything."

"When you get home I'll be getting ready to head to the studio. I was wondering if you'd be willing to save my skin - the software engineer I mentioned in my last show called and he isn't coming. Would you instead be willing to join me on the show?"

"But what about Kaden?"

"I don't know, maybe you could take him with you? Now that I think of it a baby might do wonders for the view rates."

Michael laughed. "I'll come pick you up then." he said as he steered his ship out of the atmosphere.

"Fly safe, honey. I'll be waiting."

After picking up Alexis they headed to the studio. Michael had to wait backstage for a while as Alexis had to introduce the show first. Soon enough however, he was called on-stage.

Alexis looked as radiant as ever, and Michael couldn't help but laugh wholeheartedly at seeing his wife. "And our guest for tonight, ladies and gentlemen, Michael Starlight!" she said, getting up. "Oh, I see you've got your hands full." she said, nodding to the infant in Michael's arms.

Michael nodded. "Yeah. Couldn't find someone to look after him as accepting the offer to be here on the show was kind of a last-minute decision on the show's part. Not that I'm complaining, I'm glad to be here."

Alexis smiled, and they both took a seat. "So," Alexis said, folding her hands. "Can you tell us more about the nature of the intrusion?"

"Certainly. The affected software all had the same sneaky yet critical error when it came to evaluating received data. Apparently sending a different data type than expected would cause the system to not dunk the data instantly but instead would have it circulate for a few moments, enough for a potential virus to start wreaking havoc and, depending on the nature of the virus, hijack the system."

Alexis nodded sternly. "How did the virus operate exactly?"

"Why is a mystery to me, but how? It's a standard ransomware, although this one only encrypted a few critical operating system components, granting the user no access to their computer at all while classic ransomware encrypts the hard drive and forces the user to pay a fine for the decryption key. This particular case is different in the way that it offered the user no means of decryption, leaving the conclusion that it has been designed to hold computer systems hostage indefinitely."

"M-hm. Is there also any way of finding out who is behind this attack?"

"Experts are already hard at work at tracing the virus, but I personally doubt they'll find anything. It's been rerouted past several planets, therefore I believe that, even if we pinpoint the source of the transmission, anyone who had been sending will be long gone. I do have a theory though."

"Oh? What is that?"

"On-site I discovered that the systems managing air traffic on Cobalia had the same system flaw. Thus, I think that the attack on the gel plants was just a test. I expect that the traffic systems will be hit by an unsuccessful attack within these next few days. Perhaps that one can be traced back to the attackers. Assuming they're stupid enough to pull off another attack. I mean, since this is broadcasted all over the galaxy there's a good chance they'll see it and keep their heads down. Whatever their next move is, the air traffic is safe."

* * *

After his interview, Michael waited backstage for Alexis. Kaden's large green orbs had been all over the place, the little boy not knowing where to look in this new environment. " _At least he's enjoying himself._ " Michael thought with a chuckle.

About half an hour later Alexis appeared. "There we go. Should I take Kaden?"

"Yes please." Michael said, carefully handing her their infant son. After a flight home, that Kaden spent entirely staring out at the stars, Alexis made them dinner.

* * *

Michael was suddenly forced out of his thoughts. His ears perked up, and he frowned. "What's that sound?" he mumbled.

Alexis stirred in her sleep as well, her ears twitching as she frowned in her sleep before waking up altogether. "What is..."

"I don't know." Michael said as he sat up in bed and looked around, ears twitching at the faint hum in the distance. "But I'm guessing you're hearing it too?"

"Yeah... there's a faint hum... I can't lay my finger on it exactly."

The humming got louder, and suddenly two pairs of eyes widened in realization.

An ear-shattering thud followed that made the whole house shudder. Alexis screamed and Michael instantly wrapped his arms around his wife, pushing her against him.

* * *

 **Alright, people what might that explosion be? Find out in the next chapter!  
**

 **...**

 **Yeah, I really don't have inspiration for outros anymore...**

 **Either way, after reading a good book by Carlos Ruiz Zafón I've been inspired to increase the quality of my English even further, so that's something I'll be working on. I don't know how noticeable it will be but I hope to have a significant change in writing style a few chapters later.**

 **That's about it, folks. Let's skip to the review replies!**

* * *

 **bajy: "** ** _Love this chapter!  
its so sweet!  
What will happen next?  
looking forward to reading more soon!_"  
Thank you! And apologies for having you wait for so long. I hope I can get chapter 6 done sooner. Either way, here's hoping this chapter lived up to your expectations.**

 **SpecterXCove: "** ** _Not much I can say this early but the writing seems well done._ "  
Hey, a new reviewer! Welcome! And thank you so much for the compliment, this really made my day!**

 **SpecterXCove: "** ** _This made me all smiles. Nice work._ "  
I'm really glad it did! Thank you once again for reviewing, here's hoping this chapter, and the ones after that (when I finally release them...), live up to your expectation.**

 **TheLilyoftheValley: "** ** _I swear, I just never have enough time to give reviews anymore._**

Y _ **ay! Some of my suggestions were used! Alright, I'll tackle them in order. First, the zoo oneshot: Adorable, and at the same time bittersweet, since we kind of know what Mukow's going to turn into a some point (also, my tragedy senses are tingling here. One random headache could mean something in later chapters). Second, the meeting Amelia oneshot: Also adorable and kind of heartwarming with Michael's generosity. Third, the video game progress oneshot: A nice way to show how hard-working Michael is on his project, however I will say that it does seem a little weird for Kaden to know the word "illusion" that early in his life (it just seems a little too advanced for his mind at this age). Lastly, the spinach oneshot: Cute and funny, and I see what you did there Guardian. You think you can sneak in a quote from Ratchet from the cut-scene before the battle with Tachyon and have me not notice?! HA! You can't sneak them past me! I was obsessed with that game before CiT came out, and I can recite most of the cutscenes from memory! You put a ToD quote in there and I will find it mister!**_

 _ **Now to address things that aren't part of the story. 1) Seriously Guardian, if you need ideas, don't be afraid to PM me. Over the last week I came up with five fics; one of the story ideas popped into my head after reading a character's name. I have a boatload of ideas at the moment. I may take a while to answer since I'm entering my last few weeks of school (and with exams coming up), but I can try to help if you need it. 2) *stares at the line "which counts some of the greatest writers in this archive"* One day I shall join those ranks... probably during the summer when I have time to write.**_

 _ **Great job on this chapter! I can't wait to read the next one! :)**_ **"  
Yeah... Mukow had a pretty strong impact on me. ToD in general, how Tachyon's constantly doing everything he can to kill Ratchet just because of what he is... I can't imagine what Ratchet must've felt like, being hunted every second for something he couldn't have done anything about.**

 **Kaden didn't really use the word 'illusion', he just made a sound that he thougt fit the planet, which Michael translated into 'illusion'. Kaden has no idea what he's doing at this point XD**

 **Yeah, I thought it'd do well as some kind of 'family-phrase', that Kaden says the same to Ratchet at some point when Ratchet's an infant and the line pops into his head in ToD. I can also recite most of the cutscenes from memory, but that's because I have a mind like a safe and can't seem to forget them...**

 **Thank you for the offer, I'll certainly take you up on it should I be in need of ideas at some point. Lots of luck with your exams, I've been there so I can say what a pain it can be. Just keep calm, believe in yourself, and my best advice - stay sharp. Make sure you don't overlook something by accident.**

 **(Psst... to me you're already among those ranks...)**

* * *

 **One last thing before I sign off, I'm also hard at work on the next chapters of Epilogue 3 and True Heroes, expect those to appear soon!**

 **Alright, that was it, see you all (hopefully soon) in the next chapter!**

 **\- TWG**


	6. New Arrivals

**Still kicking, everyone! Sorry once again for the delay, I keep gaining and losing my writing mojo at irregular intervals. Either way, with school out of the way for at least six weeks, I'll try to step up my game at least a little bit and push out updates more often.  
**

 **With that said, this chapter is late as is, so let's get to the story itself, shall we?**

* * *

Neither Lombax dared to open their eyes for a few minutes. They just sat there, holding each other tightly as their ears slowly stopped ringing.

Soon enough, however, Alexis slowly reopened her eyes. Various items had been knocked over, and some pictures she had hung on the wall had fallen off.

"Michael?"

"What is it?"

"Kaden."

Michael's eyes shot open and he stormed out of bed. "Stop!" Alexis frantically yelled, and Michael froze.

"Some of the picture frames shattered, keep an eye out for glass shards!" she warned as she got out of bed as well.

Michael nodded and charged out the room. He sprinted through the hallway, barely avoiding tripping over his own feet, and ran into the room belonging to his now seven-year-old son. Kaden had fallen out of bed, and was holding his left foot.

"Son, are you okay?!" Michael shouted.

"I'm alright, daddy. I just hurt my foot."

"Let me look at that." Michael commanded.

Kaden moved his hands back. Michael took a knee and carefully touched his son's foot. "Does this hurt?"

Kaden nodded.

"Broken foot, probably." Michael said. Alexis came storming in after him.

"Lex, I need three planks, a saw, and tape." Michael commanded. She nodded, and ran out of the room immediately. She soon returned with the requested items. "Thank goodness you don't ever clear the garage." she said, shooting Michael a pointed glare.

Michael rolled his eyes as he got to work, constructing a basic wooden frame around Kaden's left leg that supported his foot, conveying the pressure away from the broken bones. "That should do it. Can you walk?" Michael said, offering his son a hand.

Kaden nodded. He took his father's hand, and slowly began to walk around. He stumbled almost immediately however, though a fast action from Alexis prevented him from hurting himself by accident.

"Lean on me, Kaden." she said, wrapping an arm around her son's shoulders.

Michael nodded grimly. "Now let's see what the bloody hell happened outside."

They walked down the stairs, and Michael immediately noticed something through the window. Or, where the window had been, as something had shattered it. This something turned out to be... a piece of metal debris?

Michael ran into the backyard, where he found a crater. There was a rather primitive-looking vessel inside, half-buried into the soil.

Michael had not seen anything like it. It looked barely spaceworthy, yet here it was. Michael hurried back inside, to the garage, and picked up his toolbox, before charging back to the crashed vessel.

Taking an Omni-Wrench 500 out of the toolbox, Michael forced the head of the wrench in-between two plates of the spacecraft and pried one loose.

"What's inside, daddy?" Kaden asked.

Michael couldn't believe his eyes.

It was a boy, about as old as his own son. Cream-colored skin and brown hair although, unlike Lombaxes, the hair, which was brown in color, seemed to only appear on top of the child's head, whereas a Lombax was covered in it.

The head was also different. It was smaller and more oval-shaped rather than roughly circular. Michael also noticed that it lacked a tail.

"Lex, help me!"

"Kaden, can you stand on your own?" she asked her son immediately.

Kaden nodded.

Alexis sighed, and let Kaden go, who wobbled for two seconds before regaining his balance. She then quickly hurried over to Michael's side, and looked at what was inside the shuttle.

"Damn."

"I know. I have so many questions right now, but the important thing is - we need to get him out of there."

Alexis nodded, and took position on one side of the spacecraft. As one they lifted the child out of the wreckage, and carried him inside. Kaden watched it with great interest.

After laying the child down on the couch, Alexis hurried outside to support Kaden while Michael went to grab a spare pillow and sheets.

While Alexis guided Kaden up the stairs despite his protests that he wanted to meet their guest, Michael gently lifted up the head of the mysterious child before moving the pillow underneath, then gently layed a spare sheet over the small being.

"What happened to you, kiddo?" he mumbled before going up the stairs as well.

Meanwhile Kaden lay down in his bed with Alexis' help. "Mommy? Can I sleep downstairs tonight?"

Alexis shook her head. "It's best to let him rest, dear. Who knows what he's been through." she replied before planting a kiss on the forehead of her child. "Sleep well, dear." she said before exiting the room, making sure to turn off the lights on her way out.

* * *

The next morning, Michael was first to go downstairs. Alexis would help their son down the stairs while he checked up on their guest.

He found the mysterious boy exactly where he had left him. The child was still asleep apparently.

Alexis sat Kaden down at the kitchen table, and proceeded to make breakfast for her husband and son.

Michael walked over to her after having checked up on their guest. "How is he doing?" she whispered.

"Still asleep, apparently." Michael mumbled, rubbing his eyes. "I'll take Kaden to the hospital in Praxus City to get his leg checked out."

"Thank you dear. Any requests regarding breakfast?" she replied, intentionally keeping her voice low so she wouldn't disturb their guest.

"Eggs and bacon would be bull's eye. Thanks, dear." he replied, giving her a peck on the cheek that still sent chills down her spine after so long.

"Me too, mommy!" Kaden said from the kitchen table.

"Please, Kaden, keep it down, we don't want to wake up our guest now do we? Either way, two eggs and bacon coming right up." she whispered at her son over her shoulder.

A delicious smell filled the house as Alexis got to work. Kaden's eyes were all over the place, as usual, while he waited. One second he was staring at the fridge and wondering how it worked, the next his mind was trying to break the television apart. Then his eyes fell upon their guest however, and Kaden saw the child stare at him.

"Mom!" Kaden cried out excitedly, his head turning to his mother instantly. Alexis turned around instantly, eyes on fire. "SSSSH!" she hissed, making Kaden flinch, and hoping her son hadn't waken up the child on the couch. By the looks of things, he hadn't, the child hadn't moved in any way.

She let out a sigh of relief. "What is it, Kaden?" she whispered to her son, being extra cautious to not take away even more rest from their more than likely energy-deprived guest.

"I just saw him move." Kaden said excitedly although keeping his voice low.

Michael took a very good look at the boy, before shaking his head with a shrug. "You were probably just imagining things, kiddo." she said, running a hand through her son's headfur before giving him his breakfast. She then quickly went to fetch her husband's meal from the stove while her son started his food, occasionally throwing a glance over his shoulder at the child sleeping on the couch.

He knew what he had seen.

After breakfast,Michael left with Kaden to get his son's leg checked out. After finishing her own food, Alexis grabbed a book and sat down across from the mysterious boy, occasionally glancing at the face of the sleeping child in hope of a sign of awakening, but so far nothing had happened, and it was frightening her. Just who was this mysterious child, where had it come from, what race was it, what were it's intentions, and more importantly, would it ever re-awaken?

After three long hours nothing had happened yet, and Alexis was getting hopeless. The child had been asleep for so long now that her concerns for it's safety were reaching the point where she considered trying to wake it.

Shortly after she put away her book (although she had read very little in the last three hours anways) and silently got up. She sneaked closer to the child and slowly moved her hand closer to it's face to touch it's cheek.

Then she heard a key in the lock behind her. She quickly got up and walked over to the front door just in time to witness it swing open. Kaden was first to enter, using a wheelchair with a foot wrapped in plaster and a rather unamused expression radiating from his face.

To say that Kaden was not enjoying his current predicament, having to rely on a 'clunky chair with wheels', as he would grumpily call his wheelchair several times within the next few hours, would be the understatement of the decade.

Alexis felt so sorry for him. If there was one lively and energetic boy she knew then it was Kaden. Having to put his passion of exploring (even though he tried to explore the cookie jar too often for Alexis' liking) on hold for who knows how long must certainly hurt.

Then she realized in shock horror that all of Kaden's toys - building bricks, junior engineering kits, et cetera all required him to be able to use his legs, thus the only entertainment Kaden likely would be getting for a while was holovision.

She knelt down as Kaden rolled over to her with an expression as if someone had dripped juice of a very sour fruit on his tongue. Alexis inspected the plaster carefully. It was done quite skillfully, though she noticed how it was not prepared properly for long-term use.

"He only needs plaster for a week." Michael said, as if he could read her mind. "After that bandages and crutches for a month will do the trick."

Alexis hugged her son. "I'm so sorry, kiddo. I'll make it up to you by making sure you're well entertained."

"But what about your job?"

"You are more important. If my boss can't see that, he's not worthy of any more of my time."

* * *

Throughout the day Kaden kept a close eye on their visitor, that had not moved once. The child intrigued him, this mysterious being from another world that was currently resting on their couch.

After dinner, Michael carried him up the stairs, Alexis following him with the wheelchair. That night however, Kaden didn't close an eye. He waited patiently for the light in his parents' room to turn off, and an hour after that Kaden slowly got out of bed.

Thanks to his leg, he had to crawl across the floor like a handicapped spider, keeping his leg elevated.

Soon enough he reached the stairs. He managed to climb down by repeatedly hanging onto the railing and quickly moving his good foot down one stair.

After that Kaden crabwalked over to the child, that was still lying motionlessly on the couch.

Kaden took a good look at it's face. It showed no signs of anything - no emotion, no expression, no feelings. It scared him a little.

Kaden carefully moved his ear in front of the child's mouth, and shivers were sent down his spine as the child's shallow breaths tickled his ears.

So it was still alive. But how to wake it up?

Kaden climbed up and sat down in one of the chairs around the coffee table as his mind sought a solution.

Then he remembered something. " _Last year's summer vacation!_ " echoed through his mind.

As they were going far from home during last year's summer, the plan was to start flying during the night. Except waking up Kaden proved to be quite the challenge. Alexis had finally managed to wake up the young Lombax by tickling him.

Perhaps that experience might help Kaden achieve his goal. Kaden slowly got off the chair and moved over to the child.

"Hey." Kaden whispered. "I know you're awake."

No answer. "C'mon, stop acting like you're dead!" Kaden tried again, without success.

Kaden shrugged. "You asked for it."

He began to tickle the child. Soon enough muscles in the child's face began to tremble before the child finally shot upright with a muffled laugh.

As soon as Kaden removed his hands the eyes of the child shot fire. "You... you... you..."

"Yes?" Kaden patiently asked, not deterred in the slightest by the child's glare.

"Ah, forget it." the child hissed.

"What's your name?" Kaden asked, feeling a pang of sympathy.

That made the mysterious child freeze. It reached for it's head with a pained expression that only worsened, as if it was having a headache. "S... s... s..." it whispered, eyes screwed shut. "Sss... Simon!"

"Is... is everything okay?" Kaden asked.

Simon shook his head. "I can barely remember anything."

"Where did you come from?" Kaden asked on, his curiosity getting the better of him.

"I just told you - I can't remember! Remembering my own name hurts."

"I'm sorry."Kaden said, ears lowering slightly. "But why did you pretend to be asleep this whole time?"

"I was afraid of what would happen, honestly."

"Are you afraid of me?" Kaden said, ears lowering further.

"I... I don't know. I'm not even sure if I remember what being afraid means."

"Do you want to get away?"

"Uh... I don't think so..."

Kaden sighed. "Stop worrying so much! We're not gonna hurt you!"

Simon hugged his knees. "How was I supposed to know?"

"Ergh, true." Kaden admitted, staring at the ground. Then he looked up. "Do you want me to stay?"

"...Yes please."

"Okay then. Throw me some of those pillows." Kaden said, pointing at the two large pillows forming the back of the couch. As requested, Simon grabbed the pillows and, with some effort, pulled them off the couch and threw them over his shoulder, at Kaden, who skillfully caught them and used them to construct a makeshift bed.

"Alright." Kaden said, laying down. "Good night!"

Simon didn't respond. Soon enough he saw Kaden's breathing slow to the steady rhythm of sleep. He stared at the small, furred figure and it's large ears in silence for a few moments before falling asleep himself.

* * *

The next morning, Alexis stayed in bed a little longer while Michael got up to help his temporarily disabled son get up. Imagine his surprise and panic when he found his son's bed to be empty, with the wheelchair still standing by the bed.

He charged down the stairs and let out a sigh of relief when he spotted his son's sandy colored ears stick out from behind the couch.

"What's going on?" Alexis said through a yawn as she came walking down the stairs.

Michael motioned for her to stay quiet, and together they sneaked down the stairs. "Look at this." Michael whispered, pointing at Kaden, asleep on the ground near their guest.

Alexis chuckled and knelt down next to her child, before carefully waking him up. Soon enough Kaden opened his eyes. It stayed quiet for a few long moments, before Kaden spoke up with a small voice.

"Am I in trouble?"

Alexis laughed and embraced her son. "Goodness, no! But you could have hurt yourself, Kaden!"

"I know... I just didn't want Simon to be alone."

"Simon?" Michael asked, tilting his head in confusion.

"Oh yeah!" Kaden said before trying to get up, forgetting about his foot completely. Alexis quickly supported him. "Careful! You'll hurt yourself!" she warned.

"Sorry, mom." Kaden said as he moved over to the child sleeping on the couch before poking it's arm. "Simon? I know you're awake. Don't be scared now."

No response. Kaden's mind ran a mile a minute, and soon enough he recalled the words his father had said to him, about bravery, before quickly reworking them to make them more apply-able.

"Simon, they say heroes don't run from anything."

That seemed to have effect, and slowly Simon's eyes opened.

Michael and Alexis stood frozen, staring at the child while the brown-haired child stared back. When the silence got unbearable, Kaden broke the silence. "Mom, daddy, shouldn't you introduce yourselves?"

Alexis blinked a few times, then chuckled. "I'm sorry. You're right."

She turned to the child lying on the couch. "I am Alexis, and that man behind me is Michael, my husband. I'm really glad to see you're okay."

"Simon, now is your turn." Kaden said with a patient smile.

If the fact that Simon understood Galactic Standard wasn't surprising enough, the fact that he could fluently speak it made it a thousand times crazier.

"I... my name is Simon." the child reluctantly said.

"Please excuse me, but... why are you afraid of us?"

"I just... I just never saw anything like you guys before."

"Where did you even come from?" Michael asked, curiosity getting the better of him as he took a step forward.

Simon flinched and pushed himself into the couch, trying to get away from Michael. Michael stopped instantly, and took a knee. "I'm sorry, kiddo. I don't want to make you uncomfortable."

Alexis tried slowly reaching out, and Simon flinched again.

But then Kaden tried. Michael and Alexis held their breath as Kaden's small hand moved closer and closer, and they could scream in joy when Simon's right hand moved to meet Kaden's, but they kept quiet for Simon's sake, they didn't want to startle the poor boy after all he had been through.

After what seemed like an eternity, the two hands met.

The room was shrouded in a heavy silence as the seconds ticked by, and after what felt like years, a small voice broke the silence.

"Your hand is so... soft."

"Yours is sticky." Kaden said, putting on a somewhat disgusted face.

Simon moved his hand back. "I'm sorry."

Kaden chuckled. "Gotcha!" he said, playfully sticking out his tongue.

Simon didn't take it the right way. "Not again!" the child cried out before pressing his face into the couch. A muffled scream of frustration followed.

Kaden's smile vanished and was replaced by a look of guilt. He had not expected his joke to turn into such a sour result.

Alexis placed a hand on her son's left shoulders, and their gazes met, Kaden's one of worry and sadness while Alexis' gaze, which Kaden had expected to be angry, was calming instead.

Alexis moved closer, and gently placed a hand on Simon's shoulder.

"Leave me alone!" the child screamed.

Alexis glanced over her shoulder at her husband, who shrugged in return. She rolled her eyes before turning to the child crying into the couch. "Hey, hey, what's got you so worked up all of a sudden? Kaden did not mean to upset you." she softly asked.

"Just stop."

Alexis gently pulled on the child's left shoulder, and Simon got up a little to slap her hand away. Before he could however, Alexis wrapped her arms around the child and pulled him into a hug. "There, there." she soothed. "Let it all go. You must've had a rough trip."

The child buried his face in the fur on her neck and slowly nodded. Alexis felt a tear run down her neck, but she managed to suppress the shiver it tried to send down her spine.

"Am I in trouble, dad?" Kaden whispered to his father. Michael smiled, and ran a hand through the fur covering his son's head. "You did great, kiddo." he whispered back. "Why don't you go play in your room? I'll be right there."

Kaden nodded, and watched over his shoulder as Michael and Alexis sat down on the couch, Simon in between them.

" _This poor child... he must've been through something awful._ " Alexis thought, the sadness of the being crying into her neck forming a heavy weight on her heart, and soon enough a single tear ran down her cheek as well.

Kaden noticed the lonely tear, and quickly made his way to his room.

For the next few hours, Kaden did nothing but pace (or crawl, since his foot was broken) back and forth in worry. He tried to relax but to no avail. Thus, when his father came into his room about two hours later, Kaden jumped and was already bombarding him with questions in less than five seconds after Michael had opened the door.

Micheal said nothing as he sat down on Kaden's bed, before motioning for the young Lombax to come sit with him.

Kaden fell silent and obeyed, trying to climb onto the bed. Michael reached out and pulled his child up so that Kaden could climb on.

Michael's face was made of steel as he stared at the wall across from them. "Kaden."

"Yes, dad?"

"Simon... that poor kid... he's not from Fastoon."

"Then were did he come from?" Kaden asked, tilting his head.

Michael shook his head. "He hasn't told us yet, and I don't want to pressurize that poor kid either after falling from orbit like that. The fact that he didn't know what a Lombax was worried me, and my worry only increased when I learned that he is not even from this galaxy."

"He's... from another galaxy?"

Michael nodded. "I don't know how he ended up in that capsule, but he's been through hell."

He sighed. "I'm gonna have to help your mother with dinner now or she'll have my head for sure. Just, Kaden, promise me one thing."

"Yes, daddy?"

"Don't stress Simon. Don't ask questions and just let him be. I'm confident he'll explain what happened when he feels like doing so. When he's ready."

"Promised."

Michael smiled, and pet his son on the head. "That's my boy."

Michael got off the bed and knelt down in front of Kaden, his back turned to his son. "Come on, I'll carry you downstairs."

A minute later Michael came down the stairs, an exited and cheering Kaden sitting on his shoulders. He gave his wife a kiss on the cheek before helping Kaden climb off. Immediately Kaden crawled over to the mysterious child sitting by the window. "Hey." he said. "I'm sorry for what happened. I didn't want to make you upset."

Simon sighed and nodded without looking around. "I'm sorry for overreacting like that... Kaden was it, right?

"Yes."

Simon motioned for Kaden to sit with him, and together they sat, watching the clouds as the sun set while Kaden's parents worked on dinner together.

"Simon?"

"Huh?"

"I hope you'll feel like home here."

And for the first time, Simon smiled. "Thank you, Kaden."

* * *

 **Whoooo, enter OC Simon!  
**

 **Honestly I was quite torn on whether or not I should add him to the plot, but in the end the choice was made based on how much he would contribute to the storyline.**

 **Anyhow, let's get to the review replies!**

* * *

 **bajy: "** ** _Love this chapter!_  
 _it was very sweet!_  
 _looking forward to reading more soon!_  
 _Sorry this review is short, I got things to do right now_ "  
Thank you! I'm sorry for leaving you waiting for so long. And that's totally fine, the fact that you take some time to leave any kind of review is already a huge compliment to me. Thank you once again, and I hope this chapter lived up to your expectations.**

 **Max Chronicle: "** ** _I just have one thing to say to this chapter... Spiz. At least to the third degree.  
Max out._"  
Thanks again, Max! I hope I can add even more spiz if possible! :)  
Apologies for how late this update is, and I hope you enjoyed this chapter.**

 **Falcy: "** ** _Another great chapter, WG. Can't wait for the next one. Anyhoo, keep it up! :)_**

 _ **P.S. I'm guessing the explosion might be from a Cragmite invasion. Who knows!**_  
 ** _P.S.S. Since you're now working on Epilogue 3, are you gonna stick to the story you were working on, or just start a new one?_ "  
Thank you! And I hope the next chapter won't take as long to finish... that said, I hope you enjoyed this chapter just as much.  
P.S. Who knows indeed! I won't spoil anything, but then again you may have already finished reading by now so I doubt there's anything left to spoil. :)  
P.S.S. I am honestly regretting making it a Sonic crossover. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but shortly after starting I realized I shouldn't write about a fandom that I know very little about. I'm still debating whether or not I should delete the current Epilogue 3 and start anew. In fact I am considering rewriting the entire series - but not now, I currently have enough to finish as is... Anyhow, I'm still not sure what I'm going to do with it, though my finger is moving closer to the delete button every day. I hope you understand, and that I can deliver the story you're hoping for when it comes to Epilogue 3 regardless of my final decision.**

 **TheLilyoftheValley: "** ** _OH MY GOD! I haven't reviewed this story since the middle of April! 0_0_**

 _ **I am very sorry about how long I took to review this. I remember I read this chapter not a full hour after its release, but at the time, I didn't have the energy to review it. Fast forward to now, when my brain suddenly realized that I hadn't reviewed this past chapter. Do forgive me on this, although you may know the reason as to why I've been slacking on my reviews as of late...**_

 _ **Alright, first off, this chapter had an interesting setup, and I actually quite liked how things turned out. It gave us a few flashbacks instead of cutting around to different points in Kaden's life, and I think you did a great job on its execution.**_

 _ **Second off, I'll talk about my opinions on each of the shorts. The first one was my favorite, as it was adorable and heartwarming, and that's one of the parts I love about children growing up. The second short pretty cool, since we got both a heartwarming moment and a deeper look at how Michael's work is going (and how much effort he's putting into it). It shows how dedicated Michael can be, and ends with another important moment of Kaden's life, where we can see just how far Kaden's come.**_

 _ **As for the last two shorts, I noticed a shift in who the story would direct it too, with the third one giving us a broader focus on Alexis and the last one (before the end of the flashback) giving us another close look at Michael. Both of these shorts did an amazing job at expanding their characters, and things have been going so well for them that I feel like tragedy will strike at any moment. Especially after Alexis kicked butt and Michael saved so many creatures! Man, those were both awesome scenes! I do wish there was a little more character development for Kaden, but my belief on this is that you are trying to build up Kaden's parents first, and make them into great characters in their own right, and then focus the story back to Kaden in later chapters (not to mention, you cannot grow every character at the same time without causing a lot of confusion). Long story short, you've done and are doing a great job at building up Michael and Alexis, I just hope there will be more Kaden focused chapters to come.**_

 _ **And what about an explosion? *rereads last few lines* Oh no... that ain't good...**_

 ** _Awesome job on this chapter! Keep up the amazing work! :)_ "  
That's okay, I haven't updated this story in months either...**

 **Of course I forgive you - please don't feel forced to leave reviews on my works. Not because I don't appreciate them - I really, really do, but because that's not the kind of writer I want to be - the one who keeps bugging people about reviewing. Please, review in your time!**

 **Thank you! I'm glad I made the flashbacks neither too subtle nor too... 'rough'. As for Kaden - nail on the head! I plan on dedicating chapters to every chapter - one character at a time - to both balance out the 'spotlight time' as well as build on the characters in a way that is easy to follow.**

 **Anyhow, thank you once again for your review! I hope both this chapter and the ones that follow it will live up to your expectations.**

* * *

 **Alright, folks! (Hopefully) see you all (soon? I hope...) in the next chapter!**


	7. Stormy Shenanigans

**Hey all, long time no see!**

 **Allow me to provide a brief explanation regarding this chapter. More specifically, why it took me a month to update.**

 **The reason is because of my three week vacation to France. If it would've been better for my sanity to stay at home is debatable, but the point is - those three weeks drained me of inspiration, and now that I'm finally back home, I hope I can increase my writing speed.**

 **I apologize for how long this chapter took, and I hope I can have the next one done sooner.**

 **I would also like to take a brief moment to thank fellow writer TheLilyoftheValley for her, as she beta-read the chapter. Check out her stuff if you haven't already, because she's an amazing, amazing writer.**

 **Alright, now let's reply to the reviews!**

* * *

 **bajy: "** ** _Totally worth the long wait  
was not expecting this  
this chapter was good!  
you did very well on this chapter!  
Being an adventurer myself I think I too would be pretty miffed if I got a broken leg and could not do much for some time, though even I know that I'd have to let my leg get healed and wait patiently or otherwise I'd end up making it worse.  
What will happen next?  
looking forward to reading more soon!_"  
Thank you! I'm glad to see you're still enjoying this despite all of the long waits. Being unable to explore as much as he wants to is definitely a bummer for Kaden, but thankfully he has a loving family to help him through it all. Anyhow, thank you once again for reading and reviewing, and I hope you'll enjoy this next chapter just as much.**

 **jozs001: "** ** _This is a really amazing story so far and I love it even more for the human OC. There is literally no good story of a Lombax/Human OC. Continue please and I'm really interested how these two turn out when they are older... BUT! You are not forgetting Clank are you?_ "  
Uuh... this story is not going to be Lombax/Human OC. The Human OC is male, and neither he nor Kaden are homosexual (otherwise Ratchet wouldn't exist). I hope this didn't turn you away from the story, and that you'll keep reading it anyway. You might be positively surprised with what I have in store for that Human OC...  
I definitely have some interesting ideas for how they'll grow up, and no, Ratchet isn't complete without Clank! Do expect everyone's favorite warbot defect to make an appearance later in the story. Thank you for taking the time to review, and I hope you'll enjoy this chapter as much as the previous ones.**

 **Max Chronicle: "** ** _Simon has arrived. *Salutes*  
Starlights... be ready for an adventure like you would never believe, one full of action, heroics, a changed future, and family togetherness.  
I'll be back for more. Keep up the good work, Guardian.  
Max out._"  
Hey again Max! Yeah, I definitely have some stuff in store for that poor boy... anyhow, apologies for making you wait for so long, and I hope you'll enjoy this chapter as much as the previous ones.**

 **TheLilyoftheValley: "** ** _I'm still really bad at keeping up with giving reviews on time... -_-_**

 _ **Nonetheless, this was a pretty great chapter since it took a break from telling stories of Kaden growing up and focusing on the arrival of a new character. It was nice to take a moment and spend it in the present where we get an answer to that cliffhanger from the last chapter.**_

 _ **Speaking of which, this is the first time I'm meeting your OCs inside a story (not counting "The Second Great War" of course)! :) I really like what I see with Simon so far, and I can't wait to see what kind of part he plays in the story!**_

 _ **One thing I really liked about this chapter was the first developments of the relationship between Kaden and Simon. I love how they interact together, and I can't wait to see them grow up together. I just love the scene where Kaden volunteers to watch over Simon, and I just... I can't wait to see how this all plays out.**_

 _ **Hm... speaking of more characters, I've been wondering... Are we going to see a certain white and red-striped Lombax soon? I guess I'll just have to wait and see what happens in the coming chapters.**_

 ** _Great job on this chapter! Keep up the awesome work! :)_ "  
Hey, that's okay - I'm still really bad at updating on time. XD  
Yeah, I want to balance out the chapters where we focus on past and present, I want the story to be told partially in a third-person fashion, and partially in the form of flashbacks, or journal entries, or the like. Speaking of my Original Characters, I wonder what you'll think of my OC a few chapters later, and the relationship he has with Kaden.  
Is that a nod to Alister? If so, he was a good childhood friend of Kaden. Can't leave him out, now can I?  
**

* * *

The next day, Michael and Kaden went to a nearby store for tools and materials to fix the shattered windows. Kaden had asked for Simon to join him, but Simon was still a bit too afraid to interact with other Lombaxes. It disheartened Michael and Alexis that Simon was only comfortable around Kaden, but, they reminded themselves, at least it was something. If they were going to look after this mysterious child for a while then at least they had to be able to communicate with him.

"Daddy?" Kaden asked as they flew through Kilia City's center.

"Yes, kiddo?" Michael replied as he skillfully followed the other ships through the designated air traffic lanes.

"Can Simon stay?"

"Uh... that depends. If he's gonna stay afraid of us, then no. We can't look after a boy that is too afraid to even be near us without being comfortable."

Kaden nodded, staring out the window. "How long until I can finally get out of that stupid wheelchair?" he asked, although it was more talking to himself than a true question. Michael answered it regardless. "Only five more days, Kaden. After that, only one more month with crutches."

Kaden let out a groan of frustration and let his head rest against the windshield. "I hate this."

Michael smiled and ran a hand through his son's headfur. "Chin up, Kaden. You know what they say about heroes. And you want to be a hero, right? Like the ones in your mother's bedtime stories?"

Kaden nodded, a smile forming on his face as his father's words gave him determination. "Lombaxes don't run, and neither do heroes… I gotta stay strong."

Soon enough, Michael left the air traffic lanes and lowered the spaceship to the large store that was their destination.

The exterior of the building was a mixture of bricks and metal, giving the store a rather industrial look, which was not misplaced considering it was a store specialized in construction. For both professional carpenters and hobbyist engineers, it was a truly marvelous place, selling various kinds of materials. All kinds of woods, metals, stones and other building materials lined the shelves, and hundreds of different appliances stood tall on their displays. A rainbow of paint samples stretched from ceiling to floor with almost every color of paint color imaginable. The store sold everything, from regular hand tools to light fixtures to thumbtacks. In this case, glass was their target, as well as some strong glue.

After opening up the windshield, Michael took Kaden's wheelchair from the storage space before deploying it on the ground next to the ship. Once Kaden was in his wheelchair, Michael locked the ship, and began to roll his son to the sliding doors that marked the store's entrance.

"Whoooaaa..." Kaden whispered once they were inside. His eyes always roamed around in wonder, but in a store that fueled his creativity to new heights, his mind was constantly piecing the planks and sheets of metal together to form contraptions that, at least to him, seemed quite complex. Like his own toaster! A metal box with a blowtorch taped under it, along with a wooden framework to support it counted as a toaster, right?

Meanwhile Michael's eyes darted from sign to sign, until they settled on the one reading 'glassworks'.

Suddenly, or at least to Kaden, they made a turn left. "Aww, I wanna go check out the metal section!" Kaden whined.

Micheal laughed. "Maybe later, kiddo."

"What're we gonna get anyways?"

"Your friend Simon unfortunately shattered a few windows during his rough landing, and those need to be fixed. It's late summer Kaden, unless you want to get harassed by mosquitoes we need to patch that window. And that's why we're here."

"But I wanna look at the metal section..." Kaden said, ears lowering a little.

Michael pet his son on the head with a laugh. "Cheer up, Kay. I'm certain you'll love what we're here for."

Soon enough they reached a short waiting line in front of a rather large machine, one that immediately caught and held Kaden's interest. The young Lombax had no trouble with waiting as his eyes carefully took in and inspected every little detail, while Michael took the five minute wait to figure out possible causes for the problems that the LOD system of his game was having.

"Erm, Sir?" A voice spoke, awaking Michael from his train of thought. "It's your turn."

"U-oh, excuse me," Michael said with a laugh before walking to the control panel and entering some numbers.

"What're you doing, daddy?" Kaden asked.

"This thing, young one, is an advanced 3D printer. I just have to enter the requested dimensions and this thing will fabricate the windows we need, exactly at the right size."

"Woooow..." Kaden said, eyes wide with wonder as his father punched the measurements into the panel for the machine.

"Indeed, kiddo," Michael said before pulling the lever that activated the device. The machine whirred to life instantly, and a slight buzzing sound emitted from the machine as it began to print out the order. Soon enough the glass plates came rolling out, and the moment after it was finished, the machine ejected the printed copy of the order from a small slot near the panel.

Michael handed some of the plates to Kaden who, being in a wheelchair, had no trouble with them, while carrying some under one arm.

After paying for the glass, they made their way back to their ship. The wind picked up as they loaded the glass into the cargo space of their ship, and it had grown to storm level when Michael hastily helped Kaden get in before throwing the wheelchair on one of the back seats, getting in himself, and securing the windshield.

Not long after the engines of their ship roared to life, and soon enough the ship took off, like a majestic, metal bird, into the turbulent skies of Fastoon.

The ship shuddered as it battled the wind for domination, and Michael gritted his teeth. "You may want to hold on to something, kiddo. This may get-"

The ship shuddered heavily. "Annoying," Michael finished.

Kaden nodded and held onto his seat for dear life.

The ship rattled and shook as the wind tried so hard to knock it out of balance, but it wouldn't give in.

Kaden shuddered. "How long is this going to last?"

"Just one more minute. We're almost at the inner city, which has a current locker. Means that the winds are slowed down by a special barrier for optimal air traffic. There, that large, holographical gate is our target."

Kaden nodded, gritting his teeth as the ship shuddered even more heavily. "Daddy, this isn't fun!"

"I know, kiddo. I know."

Thankfully Michael's estimation had been correct, and soon enough the wind ceased its battle against the ship.

Kaden sighed in relief and leaned into his seat, making Michael chuckle. "Where'd that wind come from?" Kaden asked.

"Why don't you try looking it up on the central console, kiddo? If there's a storm coming I bet it'll be all over the news."

Kaden nodded, and began messing with the buttons. Fortunately he had seen his mother look up some information on the central console before from his position in the back of the ship, therefore simply doing as she did yielded the results he was looking for.

It loaded for a few seconds (greatly annoying the ever so impatient Kaden) before it displayed the logo of Fastoon Central News. "Good evening, residents of Fastoon, and visitors to the planet of course." A brown-furred Lombax with slightly longer fur on his chin spoke up.

Said Lombax was sitting behind a desk, folding his hands as he prepared to talk to the viewers. "Abnormal wind speeds have been detected over not just Lake Cirrus, but over several nearby cities as well, up to miles away from the lake, which seems to be at the center of this phenomena. Local scientists immediately began studying this strange weather and concluded that we have one heck of a storm coming. So, for all residents within a twenty-five kilometer radius of Lake Cirrus - secure your spaceships, and any belongings that you don't want flying off."

Michael's ears lowered. "Yeah, that's not good."

"Should we warn mommy?" Kaden asked, not bothering to hear the rest of the news broadcast.

"Yeah, give her a call," Michael said. "You know how to do that?"

"Yeah, I do."

"Great. Wait just a moment though, we're entering an air traffic tunnel."

And indeed, Michael flew the ship into a cylindrical hole in the wall. For a few minutes they flew through the spacious tunnel, among several other ships, before flying out into the skies of Fastoon.

"Alright, try it now," Michael said to his son, who nodded in response and began to mess with the console once again.

Not long after, Alexis appeared on the small screen, looking rather panicked. "Where are you guys?!" she instantly asked, worry straining her voice. "There's a storm coming, and I don't want you guys caught in the thick of it! It's bad enough with what I have here, please don't get into any harm."

"Alexis, what's going on?" Michael asked, put on edge by Alexis' look of terror.

"Michael, we don't have any windows to protect the inside of our house from the storm. It won't be long until our furniture will be flying through the house at this rate. Please, at least tell me you and Kaden are safe."

"We're almost there, honey. Just hold tight. Do help me with Kaden though, I'll secure the ship while you bring him to safety, okay?"

"Okay. Any estimations on the amount of time it'll take you to get here?"

"Three minutes. Just hang on."

"Gotcha. I'll keep Simon safe too. You just make sure you get yourself and our son back here in one piece."

Alexis disappeared from the monitor. Michael shuddered. "I don't like this one bit."

"Are we still inside that protective field, daddy?"

"Yeah, but we won't be for much longer. Hang onto your stones kiddo."

"Stones?"

"...I'll tell you later... You know what, ask your mom instead."

Ahead of them a blue holographic dome faded out of existence, and as soon as they passed through the ship was pulled back and forth by the wind.

Fortunately the house came into view one minute later, though Michael had to do something risky in order to land - fly very closely over the rooftops to reduce the amount of wind while making sure he wouldn't deal any damage to the houses.

Alexis had seen them coming and opened the garage that she had hastily cleared of belongings earlier. As soon as the ship was inside, Michael jumped out and began unloading the glass panels. "You know, I've never thought of flying right into the garage."

"That's because _you_ never clear it, mister," Alexis said as she helped Kaden out of the ship and into his wheelchair. "Go look for Simon, kiddo. We'll make sure the wind can't deal any more damage."

Kaden nodded, and rolled out of the room. "Alright, glass," Alexis said. "I presume you ordered that special kind?"

"Yep," Michael said, taking a can of glue out of the cargo space. "Easy to apply, quick to dry, and stronger than a Z'Grute after a light-eating binge. Let's get this done quick before the wind blows our skin off."

"Okay. I've already removed the shards of glass by the way. I'll apply the glue, you put in the glass, okay?"

"Sounds like a plan to me. Let's get to work," Michael said, grabbing a window while handing Alexis the can of glue and a brush.

Alexis quickly got to work, applying a thin layer of glue to the areas where the windows used to be, while Michael, with varying degrees of effort due to the wind pushing him back now that he was holding a large glass panel in front of him, put the glass in place. The chemicals applied to the edges of the glass did their work perfectly, solidifying the glue seconds after the glass was brought into position.

The last window was the hardest, as the storm was getting closer and closer. It took a combined effort of both Michael and Alexis to keep the window in place long enough for the glue to harden.

Michael crashed on the couch, wiping the sweat off his forehead. Alexis, on the other hand, seemed totally unaffected, as if she did this every day. She smiled at him. "Tired already, love?"

"Hey, you weren't the one pushing against glass with their whole body to keep the damn wind out."

Alexis nodded. "True," she said with a chuckle. "I'm gonna check up on the kids, see if Kaden got Simon to calm. Because when the wind started picking up and knocking over items an hour ago, he was pretty freaked out. The poor child was so spooked he could have given a ghost a run for its money."

* * *

With some difficulties, Kaden managed to move around the house in search of his friend. As soon as he had left the garage he had been hit by strong blasts of wind, forcing him to pull on the brakes of his wheelchair with full strength to avoid being blown back more than once as he continued his search.

He had checked under the couch, then in the kitchen, and on both occasions the result was negative. If someone were to walk in on Kaden during his search, all they would see is a golden tail as Kaden had to lean forward to peek inside the kitchen cabinets, leaving nothing but his tail sticking out, which the wind had immediately begun to pull on.

After concluding that Simon was not downstairs, or at least not anymore, Kaden had rolled over to the staircase. With the wind constantly threatening to pull him back and send him flying off, he had to come up with a clever solution to keep him tied down. In the end he literally tied himself down, wrapping his tail around the handrail and climbing up step by step. It wasn't comfortable, but it beat being sent flying and having to do it all over again.

Thankfully most of the upstairs windows were still intact, reducing the wind's force greatly, to Kaden's relief.

Crawling through the house, he had checked his own bedroom for signs of his friend, up to checking under his bed. He then checked the bathroom (the biggest challenge was pulling himself up so he could peek inside the bathtub to see if Simon was hiding there), his father's study (up to the point where he unscrewed the back panel of his father's computer to check inside for hints), and lastly, his parents' bedroom.

He had checked under the desk, in his mother's closet, in his father's closet, under the bed, in the pile of laundry lying on the floor that his mother still had to sort, and even behind the curtains.

Wiping the sweat off his forehead and adjusting his legs from their crawling position, he pulled himself up on his parents' bed and sat down on the bedsheet.

"Ow!"

Kaden jumped with a loud scream, landing face-first in the laundry, sending the clothing flying everywhere. Kaden got up immediately, but he put his hand down on one of his father's shirts, which made him slip and land on his back. He finally got up, one of his own shirts covering his left ear. "What was that?!"

"Nothing…" he heard a weak voice say from under the bedsheets.

Kaden laughed and crawled over to the bed before, with a forceful tug, pulling the sheets off, exposing his new friend.

"What're you doing here, Simon?" Kaden asked, sitting down while the strange child got up.

Simon stayed silent and stared at the floor.

"Are you trying to hide from the storm?" Kaden asked quietly, pulling himself up and sitting down next to his friend.

Simon nodded slowly.

"What's so scary about it anyway?"

"Why aren't you afraid?" Simon asked back, fear shining in his eyes. "The storm picks up a chair, smacks it against your head, and it's over. Or worse, it picks you up and sends you flying off to who knows where."

At first it didn't seem that scary to Kaden, but then the thought of being sent flying, pulled into the air and away from home by a violent and uncontrollable force of nature, before being dropped high above the ground made him shudder.

"Yeah… I can see why you think they're scary," Kaden said, folding his hands in his lap.

"Aren't you scared?" Simon said, looking at Kaden with a raised eyebrow.

Kaden giggled. "No. And thunderstorms are bad too… but lots of rain and wind is fine with me."

"Why is that?"

"It gives you time to think," Kaden said, letting his feet swing back and forth gently. "You know, plan your next adventure."

"That is certainly true, my little adventurer," Alexis said with a warm smile as she entered. She sat down in between the two boys and wrapped her left arm around Simon, and her right arm around Kaden.

"You know Simon, my mom always bakes cookies when there's a bad storm out," Kaden said, eyeing his mother. "They're really yummy and they can make you feel less scared during a storm."

Alexis laughed. "Oh, I know what you're hinting at," she said, running a hand through the fur on her son's head. "You know, today is one of those days that I'd make cookies on, but I, how shall I put this, 'need a hand'. A bunch of extra hands in fact, as everything has been knocked over, so it'll take a while before I'll be able to start at all, and then I won't be finished until shortly before dinner if I'm on my own."

"Sooooo… I'll have to help?" Kaden asked, tilting his head slightly.

"M-hm. If you want freshly-baked chocolate chip cookies that is," Alexis replied, booping her son's nose.

"I'm sorry," Simon suddenly spoke up.

Alexis gently squeezed the child. "Hey. hey, you have nothing to apologize for."

"No, I do. I made a mess of this bed."

Alexis laughed. Not a brief chuckle, but a warm, genuine laugh that easily cleared out the uneasy atmosphere that had been holding the room hostage. "Like it'll be picture perfect tomorrow morning after I've slept in it. Please, it's okay."

Alexis gave the child a warm smile. "Say… we're going to need eight hands working together to get the cookies done on time… would you like to help us?"

Simon stayed silent for a brief moment, staring through the window at the storm outside. Not as if it would provide him with an answer, but for something for his eyes to focus on while he thought. At last, he spoke very quietly, too quiet were it not for the trademark sensitive ears of the Lombax species. "...Do you think I can?"

"You'll be fine, we'll walk you through it every step of the way," Alexis said, rubbing the child's upper arm. "Besides, if you ask Kaden, nothing beats cookie dough."

"She's right Simon!" Kaden immediately said in an excited tone. "It's the best!"

"You just be careful to not overdo it, you can't have too much cookie dough," Alexis said with a slightly warning tone in her voice, silently reminding her son of the time when he had eaten too much dough and had ended up feeling sick for hours.

"Yes, mom. I'll take care," Kaden said, staring at his feet. "Can you blame me though? It's just so awesome!"

"Blame you, I cannot, but is it worth getting sick over?" Alexis said in an almost poetic fashion.

"I know, I know, let's get to it already," Kaden said, getting a bit impatient.

Alexis nodded. She stood up, taking Simon's hand, and guided the child down the stairs. Eleven seconds later - although it seemed like eleven minutes to the ever so impatient Kaden - Michael entered the room and helped Kaden sit down on his shoulders, before carrying his son down the stairs.

Not long after, everyone was hard at work at preparing the kitchen, as several items had been knocked off the shelves by the wind. The countertop was covered in broken glass, with spices, sugar, and salt scattered everywhere. Even some wine that Alexis had been saving to use in a dish, as the bottle had fallen over, before being smashed by a jar full of spices from Quantos.

While Simon helped Alexis with cleaning the countertop, Kaden and Michael quickly prepared the equipment that they would need, as well as gathered the ingredients.

Soon enough the kitchen was filled with joy, as everyone worked together to create the best cookies as soon as possible.

There was even a moment where Kaden, as "noble" as he was, offered to taste the dough "to check for poison" that an unseen foe may have poured in.

"You never know mommy," he said with a shake of his head. "It could be poisoned for real. Like, what if a stinky Blarg poisoned it so you'd have to make a whole new ball of cookie dough, or what if an evil mad robot scientist with a butler zapped one of the cookie dough balls with his ray gun and planned to turn it into a ball of metal?!" The little Lombax ticked off his responses on his fingers, his face the very definition of serious. "Or maybe a green cyborg ninja poisoned it?" Kaden screwed up his face in thought. "...It was definitely a green cyborg ninja mommy."

"No, no, mister," Alexis said with a laugh. "There are no smelly Blarg, evil robots, or ninjas in this house, and you're going to have to wait for the cookies to finish."

"But mooom, I'm certain I saw one just now!" Kaden tried, making Michael laugh. Michael quickly hid behind the table and wrapped an unused towel that he quickly took from a kitchen cabinet around his muzzle. "Yes, it is I, the great, uuh… ninja king!"

Alexis gave him a stare.

"It sounded a lot cooler in my head," Michael mumbled before continuing his monologue. "Those cookies are mine and mine alone, now hand them over!"

The result was Michael and Kaden 'dueling' with spoons while Simon and Alexis watched, Simon with some confusion and Alexis with amusement.

In the end, Kaden won, after a 'long and exhausting battle'. Michael leaned down on one knee, 'defeated'.

"Now, ninja king, who might you be?" Kaden said, before removing the towel hiding the lower half of his father's face.

"That's right, junior cookie-maker, I am your father!" Michael dramatically cried out, making a wide array of over-exaggerated, funny faces as everyone burst out laughing.

A half an hour later, everyone was sitting in the living room. Exhausted, but with a plate full of warm, freshly-baked chocolate chip cookies placed on the coffee table.

Of course, Kaden's impatience and his 'victory over the ninja king' earned him the privilege of eating the first cookie, which he wolfed down like he hadn't eaten in three days.

"Now, now, don't be such a glutton Kaden," Alexis warned, watching the crumbles scatter across the carpet. "And be careful with your crumbs, we don't want to walk around on crumbs or attract any bugs into the house."

"Sowy mom," Kaden said with a full mouth, before swallowing.

"Well, how is the result of our efforts, master cookie tester?" Michael asked with a smile on his face.

Kaden gave his father a thumbs up. "Master cookie tester approves."

"I'll have to try that then," Michael said, picking up a cookie.

It was then that a strange feeling washed over Kaden, as if he had forgotten something. He must have had a puzzled look on his face, for Alexis asked him if something was wrong.

"It's okay mom, it's just… I feel like I'm forgetting something."

Kaden's eyes roamed the living room, hoping that any of the objects he could see would be able to jog his memory. Finally his eyes settled on a rock in the back yard, and his eyes lit up.

"Oh yeah… Hey mommy? Daddy told me something that I don't understand today, and told me to ask you about it."

Michael turned a bit white. "I, uh… I'll be right back."

"Sure, kiddo, what did he say?" Alexis asked.

"What are 'stones'? As in, 'holding onto your stones'? When we were flying through the storm, he told me to hang onto them. Then he told me to ask you about them."

Alexis stayed silent for a moment, her face a mask of steel. "Excuse me for a few minutes. I need to go speak to your father real quick Kaden," she said before taking off after Michael.

He definitely had some explaining ahead of him.

* * *

 **Alright, there we go! Sorry again for this long wait, I hope I can get the next chapter done a bit sooner.**

 **...**

 **Yeah, I'm out of inspiration for author's notes...**


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